UnConventional Survival Horror
by Phoenix-KaZ
Summary: What happens when a viral outbreak occurs in the middle of a convention? Three survivors team up with the Resident Evil cast and hope to make it out alive. Rated 'T' for language and zombie gore. Includes guest characters.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: First Published story! I've been writing fanfiction for a while, but now I feel brave enough to actually post stuff on . Go Me!**

**Reviews will be lovely; I want to get better at making my stories more dynamic and interesting. Constructive criticism is accepted as well. If I get enough people interested, I will post more chapters. For now, enjoy!  
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**Copyright Disclaim: I do not own Resident Evil or any of it's characters. This fanfic is for the amusement of myself and other enthusiasts. I receive no money whatsoever.**

The sun had barely peeked over the horizon when an alarm clock broke the early silence, only to be smacked a few seconds later by its owner. The excited teenage girl sprang upright in her bed, mind instantly awakened by one thought. "KumoriCon." The teenager kicked the rest of her blankets off and slid out of bed, crossing the floor and walking toward the air mattress where her friends slept.

"Ada, Jill," she said, using the names of the characters they had chosen to cosplay that year, "We gotta wake up. Today's the first day of you-know-what…."

'Ada' sat up in her place on the air mattress, stretched, yawned, and then turned to 'Jill' who had not yet moved, curled up in her sleeping bag. "I'm up. C'mon Jill, wakey wakey," 'Ada' coaxed, nudging 'Jill', "Claire says it's time to get up." 'Jill' grunted from the confines of her comfortable sleeping bag. "C'mon, Jill! It's K-con!" 'Jill' squirmed some more in her sleeping bag before managing to sit upright, dark brown hair covering her face. She found her glasses with her right hand and slid them onto her face in a fluid movement. "Yay! Jill's alive!" 'Ada' cheered as 'Jill' glared from under her curtain of hair. 'Jill' was not a morning person.

'Claire' turned from the spot where she had set her costume the night before. "Okay," she said, holding the components of her costume in her arms, "You guys can wake up slow and gather your stuff together. I'll change into costume and get some breakfast ready."

'Ada' nodded. "Gotcha." she agreed before 'Claire' walked out of the bedroom. 'Ada maneuvered around the air mattress to get to her bag, which contained the elements of her costume. She barely noticed 'Jill' stand up, taking the blanket with her as she left the room and proceeded down the flight of stairs to 'Claire's' living room; she had left her gear down there the night before. Once Ada had her clothes gathered, she moved to wait outside the bathroom door when it slid open, revealing 'Claire' halfway dressed in her costume, minus her costume accessories with her hair unstyled.

"I'm going to grab something to eat and finish dressing up later. Want something?" 'Claire' asked 'Ada' as she passed by her friend.

"I could go for juice and a waffle." 'Ada' replied, leaning against the wall.

'Claire' mentally wrote down 'Ada's' offer. "Okay. Hey Jill! Breakfast! What do you want?" 'Claire' bellowed down the stairs.

"Toast and a glass of milk!" 'Jill' shouted from the living room.

"Got it!" 'Claire verified before walking briskly toward the kitchen, leaving 'Ada' to take over the bathroom to change into her dress.

This year, each girl decided for this year's convention that they would go as their respective heroine from the Resident Evil games. 'Jill' was strapping on her costume's combat gear downstairs as BSAA Jill Valentine from RE5. 'Ada' was straightening her dress out, making sure she looked as intense as her Resident Evil 4 counterpart. 'Claire' was halfway dressed in her costume, saving the best details of her Code: Veronica costume for last.

'Ada's' primping was interrupted by a knock on the bathroom door. "Can I come in?" 'Claire' asked from outside. 'Ada' replied affirmative and 'Claire' squeezed her way through the sliding door, slipping on the cropped red vest that took 'Claire' the better part of two weeks to sew, despite being advertised as 'Easy'. Nevertheless, 'Claire' felt a distinct sense of pride as the valkyrie motif she had painted on the vest covered her back with the words "Let Me Live" emblazoned over her shoulders. "Scoot over, Ada. I need to fix my ponytail." 'Claire' said as 'Ada' moved to one side. 'Claire' finished her hair and slipped on her fingerless gloves, completing her costume, just as 'Ada' was done fussing with her wig. The two girls looked at each other and nodded, clearing out of the bathroom as 'Jill' reached the top of the staircase, looking ready for combat.

The three girls didn't speak as they ate their breakfasts. When finished, 'Ada' helped clear the dishes as 'Claire's' mother walked in to announce that everything was set to get the girls to Kumoricon. The three energetic cosplayers wasted no time in making sure they gathered all the things they would need at the convention. ID badges, check; spending cash: check; snacks and water: check. Everything was set. The three girls piled into 'Claire's' mother's Mini Cooper, which would drop them off at the convention site and pick them up again hours later.

Traffic was thankfully light that morning, and it took only 30 minutes to get to the hotel Kumori-con was being held at. Once the carpool entered the highway, 'Claire's' mother turned on the radio. Thankfully, the radio gods were being amazingly nice and playing a selection of catchy dance songs. 'Jill', 'Claire', and 'Ada' proceeded to dance in their seats, all pumped up and excited for the 'con.

The Mini Cooper pulled up to the main doors of the hotel, dropping the girls off as 'Claire's' mother bid them adieu before driving off. The three girls received their badges and schedules, checked their props, and rushed back to the main hall of the hotel. 'Claire pulled out an assortment of highlighters as soon as they were in the main convention space.

"Okay, what events do we want to do this year?" 'Claire' asked, going into efficiency mode and uncapping a bright pink highlighter and started circling events, "We are definitely doing cosplay chess this year. We're going to have to do our shopping tomorrow; Today has some interesting events."

"Don't over schedule us, Claire," 'Ada' added, "We'll run out of energy before the giant rave party. We should have some time to wander around and get pictures as well." 'Jill' nodded in agreement.

'Claire' put her highlighter back into her bag of supplies. "Alright, if we decide to split up, make sure you have your phone where you can feel it; if not, check for messages frequently. So what do we want to do?"

"Let's see what we can find upstairs. There's a craft room up there." 'Jill' suggested.

'Ada' nodded in approval. "Okay, there's a writing panel I'm interested in that's in that same area that starts soon." 'Claire' agreed, "I'll hang out with you for a while."

The three girls made their way up the staircase of the hotel. 'Claire' and 'Ada' looked around at the clusters of cosplayers around the floor as they waited for 'Jill' to catch up to them. 'Ada' spotted one person who was wearing a convincing costume of a zombie. "Hey, Claire! Look at that guy! He's got an amazing costume." 'Ada' said, pointing him out in the crowd. 'Claire' found him near a group of cosplayers from a cartoon she was familiar with.

"Wow. He's pretty convincing for a cosplayer." 'Claire' stated as 'Jill' caught up with her and 'Ada', coming up the last set of stairs.

"I know!" 'Ada' cheered, "I'm going to ask for a picture." 'Ada' pulled her camera out of her tiny purse and started toward the zombie.

"What's going on?" 'Jill' asked as she crossed the last stair.

"Ada found a zombie cosplayer." 'Claire' said, "Seems kinda sketchy, though. I'm kinda unsure about him."

"A bit too realistic for a convention," 'Jill' noted, "But then again, people have done really convincing costumes before."

'Ada's' dress swished as she strode towards the zombie, single-mindedly focused on getting his picture. She was about to ask him for a photo when a random Lolita girl walked up and hugged the zombie violently.

"ATTACK HUG!" the cosplayer shouted before detaching herself, "What series are you-!" The cosplayer never finished her sentence as the zombie lurched around and grabbed the girl, sinking its teeth into the Lolita's flesh. The cosplayer shrieked in terror as her blood began to drip to the ground. 'Jill' and 'Claire' turned sharply at the sound of the scream.

"Holy shiitake…" 'Claire swore as her eyes widened, processing what was going on.

"Oh, no…" 'Jill' said, her expression mirroring 'Claire's', the only difference being 'Jill's' hands covering her mouth.

'Ada's' jaw dropped as she stood no more then four feet away from the zombie. The Lolita girl screamed in pain, alerting all the other convention attendees to the zombie. 'Ada' remained still as an interested look came upon her face and people started to run from the zombie. "This…this is awesome!" she thought, raising her camera to take a picture of the feasting zombie.

"ADA! GET BACK OVER HERE!" 'Ada' heard 'Claire' shouting, "HE'LL GET YOU IF YOU JUST STAND THERE!" Changing her mind about the picture she wanted, 'Ada' dashed back to the place 'Jill' and 'Claire' waited for her.

"C'mon! We're outta here!" 'Ada' said, grabbing her friends by their wrists and pulling them towards the stairs they had just come up, following the panicked tide of cosplayers. 'Ada' tried to guide her friends to the main doors but 'Claire' pulled in a different direction.

"No way! We'll be crammed like sardines in that crowd! We'll be eaten if we try those doors." 'Claire' reasoned, shouting to be heard above the din, "This way! Come on!" The three girls diverted down another path. The route led them to the second lobby of the hotel. The room was filled with even more cosplayers crowding around the revolving doors of the hotel.

"This area is packed as well." 'Jill' said, gasping for breath, "Why aren't they going outside?"

"The door mechanisms must be locked down. No one can get out or in!" 'Ada' said, peeking over the ocean of hotel staff and cosplayers in order to see what was happening at the doors. One of the convention attendees near the edge of the group dropped to the ground, bleeding badly. 'Claire' noticed another cosplayer collapse in the crowd.

"We need to get away from here, guys." she said, trying to stay calm for the sake of her friends, "This area is about to be swarming with undead. We have to go NOW." 'Claire' grabbed 'Jill' and 'Ada' by their arms and pulled them away from the crowd and back to the center of the hotel, just as the first zombies were staggering to their feet. The girls retreated to a less occupied part of the second floor, marking the stairs as an escape route if needed.

"Now what?" 'Jill' worried. She was trying to remain calm, listening to the screams of cosplayers as they were chomped on by a rapidly growing zombie horde.

"Hiding in one of these rooms would be safer, but who knows if and when we can get help; not to mention we'd be trapping ourselves in a corner. We'll stay out here where it's easier to escape. Those creeps would get in eventually." 'Claire' analyzed the situation, referring to the zombies, "Do any of you have cell service?" Each girl checked their phones. None of them had service bars. "Of course we don't," 'Ada' commented, dripping with sarcasm.

A set of gunshots echoed down the hall, making 'Ada' and 'Claire' flinch in the direction of the blasts. "That doesn't sound like a rent-a-cop's handgun." 'Jill' said, creeping out to the stairs to investigate.

"Real guns aren't allowed in convention space." 'Claire' repeated from the convention's list of rules. "Jill! Hold on." 'Claire' whispered loudly, motioning 'Ada' to stay close to her as they followed 'Jill' to the top of the stairs. The gunshots continued as the girls paused at the top of the staircase.

"Hey! What if it's dangerous?" 'Claire' whispered.

"Think we should see what going on down there?" 'Jill' asked, eyes wide in anticipation.

"Yeah," 'Ada' whispered to 'Jill', "Who wants to test the waters?"

"I'll go," 'Claire' said, "I'll head down to the landing and peek around. If it's dangerous, I can run back up quickly."

"Why not us?" 'Ada' complained.

"You're wearing a long dress, Ada. And Jill might get a bit too… distracted from the zombie horde." 'Claire' explained.

'Claire' tiptoed down the stairs, stopping on the landing. She peeked down the last flight of stairs, looking for the source of the gunshots, which had grown progressively louder while she was walking down the stairs. Among the zombies was a tall, hulky, definitely male figure. 'Claire' recognized the green fatigues, the knife in its holster, and the giant forearms holding a smoking handgun. "Holy cow…" 'Claire' said under her breath. It was none other than Chris Redfield.

"Claire? What's going on? Is it safe?" 'Jill shouted to be heard over the gunshots, watching 'Claire' intently.'

'Claire' struggled for words. "I think we'll be okay. There's a very realistic Chris Redfield here. I'm dead serious, pardon the pun." she said, stunned. 'Jill' began to walk quickly down the stairs to the landing, 'Ada' in tow. "Stop! There are still zombies down there!" 'Claire' hissed, throwing her arm out to block 'Jill's' path.

"Umm, 'Claire'. I think they heard you." 'Ada' stated, looking at the top of the stairs. 'Claire' and 'Jill' glanced up to the second floor to see a small group of zombies gathering. 'Claire' glanced back down at Chris and the clusters of zombies below them.

"We're sandwiched," 'Claire' said to her comrades, "New idea: We have to make a mad dash through those zombies down there. I can see a clear path through the center and by the wall. We should be able to get to Chris; he'll help us. Agreed?" The other girls nodded. 'Claire' bit her lip, mentally preparing herself to dash headlong into the lobby. "Okay, right. Ready, Go!" she said.

'Claire' took the stairs two at a time, running towards the area Chris was standing. "We need help! We're survivors!" she shouted, distracting some of the zombies away from 'Jill' and 'Ada' as she got closer to Chris.

Chris looked in ''Claire's' direction as she came closer. "Claire! Get behind me!" he ordered. 'Claire' slipped behind Chris as he backed up close to a wall. "What are you doing here? Are you armed?"

'Claire' shook her head, then realizing that he was unable to look away from the horde of undead, shouted in reply, "I don't know, and I don't have a gun either!"

"Shit." Chris swore as he fired another round into a zombie's skull. The zombie dropped to the ground at the Redfield's feet as he loaded another clip into his gun. "There are survivors with you?"

"Whoa, this Chris Redfield is the real deal." 'Claire' thought, staring into Chris's sculpted back muscles. "He looked too skilled to be another surviving cosplayer."

"CLAIRE! Are there other survivors?" Chris repeated, scaring 'Claire' a little.

"Yes!" 'Claire replied nervously, watching 'Ada' and 'Jill' try to sneak past the zombies. "They're coming by the wall!"

"I see them." Chris said, pulling out his knife and slicing a zombie before slamming his fist into the zombie's jaw, knocking the glorified corpse to the carpet. 'Claire' awkwardly winced, imagining the sheer force behind the hit. "Come on!" Chris shouted, getting 'Claire's' attention again.

Chris moved to stand in front of a set of double doors that 'Claire' knew led into the hotel ballroom. "Open the doors!" Chris commanded. 'Claire' opened one of the doors, and checked the room for zombies.

"It's clear!" 'Claire' told Chris as he continued firing into the crowd of zombies, taking them down one by one.

"Alright. Get your friends!" Chris ordered as he slammed another clip into his gun.

'Claire' stayed close as close to Chris as she could without going deaf from the gunshots. She cupped her hands by her mouth and shouted, "GUYS! OVER HERE! WE'LL COVER YOU!" 'Ada' nodded in response from the far wall before grasping 'Jill's' hand and dashing past the remaining undead as Chris shot each one down. The two girls rushed past 'Claire' and into the ballroom, 'Claire' declaring "SAFE" as they made it inside. 'Claire' then held the door open for Chris as he sidestepped into the ballroom before she closed the door. 'Ada' and Chris helped 'Claire' barricade the each door into the ballroom with chairs until the room was deemed secure. There was enough light in the ballroom to see each other by, but not into the shadowy corners. It was good enough for now.

"Oh, thank Everything-that-is-Holy for adrenaline." Ada said as she finally took a breather, collapsing next to 'Jill' on one of the chairs that had been spared from the barricade.

'Claire' stood at Chris's side as he checked his gun over for damage. "Thanks." she said.

"Not a problem." Chris said, holstering his handgun to look down at his 'sister', "Wait a second. You're not Claire." 'Claire' gulped. Chris's face hardened into an angry scowl. "Why are you dressed like my sister? Answer."

"Well…" 'Claire' started, feeling scared under Chris's harsh glare.

"Oh…fudge." 'Jill' commented from her seat, "This could get bad."

"Jill, You read my mind." 'Ada' added.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: By the urging of my two reviewers (haalyle and Experimental Agent 1123), I am posting the second chapter! Thank you for the encouragement! 2 reviews/favorites are great, but I want more people to read this fic. Spread the word! Tell your friends!**

**Also, I have polls. I'm considering posting another one of my RE fanfics that have been started. Which ones would my readers be interested in? Check my profile for the polls and summaries!  
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**After this I think I'll settle down a bit; Don't want to use up the chapters that I've written too fast. This chapter is a bit shortish compared to the others. Other chapters are about 3-4 pages, I think.  
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**Disclaimer: Once again, I do not own Resident Evil or the characters; they belong to Capcom. If I did, I would make certain changes to the Resident Evil movies.**

"Answer me. I've noticed one of your friends is dressed like my partner as well." Chris ordered, arms crossed over his chest. There was no need for him to pull out his knife or his gun. The sheer size of Chris's biceps was threatening enough. At this point, 'Jill' would have hugged Chris to death if he wasn't so agitated and downright intimidating.

"It…It's a very long, and very complicated story." 'Claire' stuttered, trying to explain, even though her legs were shaking.

"Go on," Chris said, staring down at her, "We've got time."

"There's a video game series about you called Resident Evil. My friends and I have played several of these games and decided to…to pay tribute to the series by dressing up as some of the female characters from the games this year. It WAS for the convention, but then…." 'Ada' explained, "Zombies."

Chris nodded again, keeping a serious look on his face. "What do you know?"

"We know about the Mansion Incident and the T-virus. I also know some things about Raccoon City and Rockfort Island. 'Ada' and I know about what happened in Spain with Leon and the Plagas, and I only know a little about what happened in Africa. I don't have many details; 'Jill' would know more than I do." 'Claire' admitted, looking to her friends nervously.

"Gee, thanks, 'Claire'." 'Jill' said sarcastically once she caught her breath.

"You girls seem to know a lot about my adventures." Chris stated with a stern look on his face, like a parent who just caught their kid with their hand in the cookie jar.

"Well, we are fans of the games." 'Ada' added sheepishly from her seat.

"Does that mean the lives of me and my partners just a game to you?" Chris growled gravely. 'Claire' involuntarily whimpered in terror. 'Jill' shrunk back in her chair a little, gloved hands gripping the cushioned seat.

"No! We actually take the games pretty seriously!" 'Jill' said, trying to cover her friend's mistake, "Except when we need humor as a coping mechanism when we get scared!" Chris exhaled deeply and appeared to calm down a little. An angry Chris Redfield was often an uncooperative Chris Redfield.

"Damn. Those guys from Capcom promised us that information wouldn't be leaked to the public." Chris muttered to himself as he stood away from the girls.

"They must have been using reverse psychology," 'Claire' suggested, "I mean, If everyone believed the events were an act of fiction, they wouldn't believe it actually happened."

"Unless they're conspiracy theorists. That is, until you showed up." 'Ada' added, grimacing at the bloodstains on her red dress, "Now that I think about it, how did you wind up here?"

Chris sighed and ran a hand through his messy hair. "Your guess is as good as mine, kiddo. I was on a mission; I blacked out, and then woke up to a hotel full of zombies and people in weird costumes. Where is 'here'?"

"You're in Vancouver, Washington, USA." 'Ada' said, "Why don't we re-introduce ourselves, Mr. Redfield? My real name is Stevie. The girl who is dressed as your partner is Mattie. The one who looks and acts like your sister is Kate."

Mattie nodded. Kate gave a small smile and waved at Chris sheepishly. "We already know who you are." Mattie stated.

"I guess that means I don't have to introduce myself; you can just call me Chris. Now, if you'll excuse me," Chris said before turning around and heading for one of the doors, "I've got to make sure this biohazard doesn't leave the hotel. "

Mattie immediately jumped up from her seat and moved between Chris and the door. "Hey! What about us?" she asked, staring up at Chris's face, "What are we supposed to do?"

Chris stopped. "This room is secure. Stay in here where it's safe. From the size of your bag, I take it you have supplies?" he asked. Kate nodded. "Wait here until I come back with help." Chris ordered, walking past Mattie and toward the doors. "I don't want civilians getting killed. I'll come back if I find more survivors, too."

Now it was Stevie's turn to jump up. "Hey! Take us with you." She pleaded, "We're sure you'll want backup for all the zombies that are still out there."

Chris turned his head to look at Stevie. "If it's zombies you're worried about, I can see a perfectly good emergency exit on the far side of the ballroom. Use that if they get in." He said.

"It's no good." Kate replied calmly, looking at the door Chris had mentioned before turning back to him, "All the emergency locks seem to have been activated. There's no way in or out of the hotel."

Stevie nodded. "Yeah, and if the doors weren't locked, there would be a lot less zombies to deal with. Get the picture?"

"Hmph." Chris grunted, "All three of you are unarmed. I don't want anyone to become a liability out there."

"But…we'll figure something out!" Mattie objected, moving back in front of Chris's path. All three girls had begun to triangulate and surround the BSAA agent, Mattie stood in front of him while Stevie and Kate flanked him on both sides from behind.

"Besides," Kate added, "We know the layout of the hotel. I know where everything is. You're going to want that later."

"You have a map I could borrow?" Chris asked, looking at Kate expectantly, holding out a gloved hand.

Kate shook her head, her ponytail swishing behind her. "Nope. Just a really good memory." She stated, "Let's make a deal: If you take me with you, I could guide you around, but I won't go anywhere without my friends."

"Yeah, Safety in numbers!" Mattie added enthusiastically, placing her hands on her hips, "We'll be each other's back-up."

"There's a better chance of survival if we stick together," Stevie added as well, "Not to mention get through this zombie horde faster."

Chris considered the reasons presented by the girls. "They've already seen the infection. If they want to fight," he thought, "I suppose it's not too late to let them have a taste of battle."

"Alright," Chris relented, "You can stay behind me, but you have to follow my orders, and we have to get you weapons and protective gear."

"Yes!" Stevie said under her breath as she pumped her fist in front of her. Kate sighed in relief and nodded quietly in approval.

"YAY!" Mattie shouted right before she jumped forward and hugged Chris around the waist, surprising the larger man. "Thank you thank you so much!"

"Whoa, Don't get too excited there. We have to find your weapons before I can take you into real combat. Unless any of you plan on hefting one of these chairs, you're out of luck." He said sarcastically, once Mattie had settled down enough to release her hold on the Redfield.

"I'm sure we'll find something out in the main part of the hotel." Kate assumed out loud as she and her friends made their way to the barricaded door. As Mattie and Chris began to dismantle the barricade around the doors, Stevie leaned in to Kate's ear.

"Do you think we'll find other Resident Evil characters around here?" Stevie asked.

Kate shrugged her shoulders. "Maybe, but who knows," she said wisely, "If Chris made it here, there's a chance some other characters might appear as well. We might have to go hunting for them though."

"That's the best part!" Stevie murmured elatedly, restraining her urge to jump up and down.

Chris set the final chair to the side of the door, in case it was needed again. "Alright. The doors are unblocked. I don't hear anything out there. Shall we go?" he asked.

"Uhhh, I vote we check just in case." Mattie suggested, standing next to Chris with an excited smile on her face. Two seconds afterward, she made a triangle with her hands and held them above the blue cap she was using for her Jill costume. Kate followed suit quickly, making the triangle above her head as well. Stevie started to make the triangle, but she wasn't fast enough.

"God-Moddit." Stevie cursed, the last person to create the 'Awkward Triangle'; she had been lumped with the job of lookout.

**A/N: And that's the second chapter! If any readers need a more in-depth explanation, hit that little review button and I'll get back to you in a PM.**

**There WILL be another RE character appearing in chapter 3! Anyone wanna guess who it might be? :3 Okay bye! Love the reviews!**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: By the urging of one my friends, I am posting the third chapter earlier than expected. So here you go! ^_^**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Resident Evil or the characters.**

The hall stood quiet. One of the double doors of the ballroom creaked open a crack. The crack was just enough to allow a teenager's head to peek through and survey the hall and lobby of the hotel. "All clear. No zombies." Stevie said to her friends on that waited inside the door, "And by none, I mean quiet as an untouched grave." The door fully opened, allowing Stevie, Kate, and Mattie to come out of the ballroom, closely followed by Chris.

"So, where should we start?" Mattie asked, glancing up and down the halls and bouncing on her feet as if the zombie apocalypse had not just broken out.

"We're getting you some supplies." Chris said, "I don't like the idea of having all three of you running around unarmed."

"Yeah but where do we get them?" Kate wondered aloud, "It's not like the hotel has its own armory."

"Maybe we should check the floor for zombies, first. It's kinda odd for all of them to be gone." Stevie suggested.

"Yeah, I have to agree with her." Kate replied, "Something about this just seems off."

"Alright, We'll patrol this area for now. See if we can't find anything useful." Chris said, "If we get attacked, run. I'm gonna have to start conserving ammo if we want to get out alive." All the girls nodded.

As Chris started walking, Mattie fell back to walk beside Kate and Stevie. "I heard you guys talking about other characters." She said, "Think we should look for them?" An eager glint behind Mattie's glasses betrayed her enthusiasm.

"I don't think it would hurt to look. I mean we found Chris in the center of the action." Stevie said, "The more help we can get, the better."

"If that's the case," Mattie commented with a mischievous smirk on her face, "I think I have a hunch where we can find one. We might have to make a detour to the hotel's dining room." Stevie and Kate both held back a chuckle.

"And I think I have an idea how we can find another character, as well." Kate said, looking at Stevie's red dress knowingly. Stevie glanced down at her dress and caught onto Kate's plan immediately.

"Oh no. You've gotta be kidding." Stevie complained, "That's a tumor, not an idea!"

Kate smirked evilly, as she always did whenever she plotted something terrible. "We'll find out soon enough. I know a good spot." She stated before running ahead and calling out, "Hey Chris! I've got an idea to run by you!"

"Are you sure this is a good idea? I'm out in the open without a gun!" Stevie called from the lower lobby of the hotel ten minutes later, looking up at Kate, Chris, and Mattie as they stood above her.

"Don't worry! You can run up the stairs if you hear zombies coming. Chris can cover you." Kate reassured from the upper balcony, "Just start going on a rant. If he's here, he'll come around."

"Who's 'he'?" Chris asked Kate with a serious face, "You know, this plan of yours is actually somewhat dangerous."

"Don't worry. I thought everything out. You'll find out who 'he' is soon enough." Kate responded, watching Stevie closely, "Hopefully this shouldn't take too long." Kate turned away from Chris to look back down at Stevie. "Okay, 'Ada', you can start rambling now!"

Stevie shook her head. "Oh, I'm not going to ramble," she taunted from below, "I am going on a full-on TANGENT! I cannot believe that you guys roped me into this! If the zombie apocalypse has not made my day, I don't know what will!"

"And there she goes." Mattie commented, "I almost wish I had some popcorn."

"First of all," Stevie ranted, "I came to this convention just to take a few pictures, show off my costume, fangirl over a couple of characters; that was all I wanted. But no, you have me down here, flashing my legs for all the zombies to see like some cheap piece of oriental takeout! Oh gods help me. And what's worse is you have me waiting here for 'him'. Not just any 'him': KENNEDY. Leon. Scott. Kennedy; who got his butt handed to him in Spain, beaten up by an ex-mercenary- Good god- you have me waiting for him! What's he gonna do? Say "Ada, wait!" , chase me and get lost –again! Is he gonna lose his jacket? I betcha he is! I betcha he's already lost it! We don't need him. We can take care of ourselves! What can he do? Whip his hair back and forth? GAWDS." Stevie finally stopped ranting long enough to pause for air.

"Ada?" a familiar masculine voice echoed form the other side of the lobby. Stevie looked through her peripheral vision, making sure her wig hid most of her face, and found the owner of the voice, complete with emo hairdo and fuzzy-lined leather jacket. "Fuuuuu-!" she raged under her breath before deciding to toy with the agent a little.

"Leon?" she responded with her back turned to him, making her voice sound as much like the real Ada's as possible. "You're here too?"

"Yeah," Leon said as he walked toward the person he presumed to be Ada Wong. As he came closer, the agent stopped. "Wait a minute, you're not-"

"Ada. Ada Wong?" Stevie answered for him, smirking, as she looked the agent in the face before turning her head to look up at the spectators. "Okay, We found him!"

Leon looked upwards. "Claire?" he asked cautiously, looking at Kate's costume.

"Hi Leon!" Mattie greeted as she waved down at the ex-cop.

"Hmm, Not exactly." Kate replied, beckoning for Stevie and Leon to come up the stairs and join them.

"Long time no see, special agent Kennedy." Chris greeted sarcastically as Leon and Stevie ascended the staircase to the balcony.

"Same to you, agent Redfield." Leon responded, "Care to tell me what's going on here? And what's with these girls?"

"Capcom let the information out to public via reverse psychology. We're still trying to figure out how the outbreak started. As for them" Chris said before turning to Stevie, Kate and Mattie who were talking in a huddle, a few feet away, "I'll explain that myself."

Out of Chris' earshot, the three girls talked. "Do not make me do that again." Stevie said, feeling particularly annoyed at being used for human bait.

"Fair enough." Kate promised, "We got what we came for."

"Hey, guys!" Mattie said, getting the attention of Chris and Leon after overhearing their conversation, "Can we have secret agent titles too?"

"No." Chris said.

"Okay then," Stevie said, changing the subject, "Why don't we see who else is around here? Mattie's got a hunch on where to find a certain someone. Right, Mattie?" Kate and Mattie nodded excitedly.

"No way." Chris said decisively, " I've let you run around unarmed long enough. I only followed Kate's plan because she said it would guarantee us some backup. That was the agreement. Now, we are going to get you girls weaponized." All three girls groaned.

**A/N: There you go: chapter 3. I won't post chapter 4 till I finish chapter 5. This might take a while. Good bye. Reviews are loved.**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Happy holidays, readers! Today i am thankful for my reviewers for giving me the confidence to share this fanfiction with the world. Thanks to my most recent reviewers, (Cherrykissez, Experimental Agent 1123, and jedispartan217), I decided to forgo sleep and finish chapter 5 and start on chapter 6, despite the fact that I've been feeling SICK and coughing all over the place.** **That's how much I love my reviewers! (Even though _somebody_ PEEKED at my unposted chapters a while ago :( You know who you are.)**

**Disclaimer: I own no aspects of Resident Evil whatsoever. I'll leave it to Capcom.**

Chris and Leon arranged a formation that involved Chris in front of the three girls, with Leon either at his side or following behind Mattie, Stevie, and Kate. The BSAA veteran had decided that it would probably be best for the small group to keep moving throughout the hallways of the hotel.

"So, Redfield, where are we going to find weapons in an infested hotel?" Leon asked from the back of the platoon, "I haven't seen any emergency caches of shotguns or ammunition lying around."

"Hey Leon," Stevie suggested, keeping pace behind Chris "What about your old friend the Merchant? He might be around here somewhere."

Leon turned his stony expression to the three girls. "Perhaps," he said, "But we have no idea where he is. Or if he's even here, for that matter."

Kate brought her hand to her chin in a thinking pose. "Hmm, let's see…" Kate said, deep in thought, "If I were a merchant, where would I set up shop?" Mattie's hand shot up.

"Ooh Ooh! I think I know!" Mattie shouted. Kate pointed at Mattie, finger pointed like a gun. "He's probably in the vendor's hall!"

Stevie nodded in agreement. "Hmm, going to the vendor's hall makes sense. Sounds like a good place to start in my opinion. We might as well cover that area first." She said. Kate nodded along quietly.

"Right." Chris said, forming a plan, "We'll go to this 'Vendor's hall' and get our weapons."

"Alright," Leon agreed, "I have to warn you though: The Merchant's wares don't come cheap. Lead the way."

Kate looked warily at Chris and Leon, a little untrusting of the two agents' serious demeanor. "Don't worry." Chris reassured, "We'll cover you from behind."

"Alright." Kate said quietly before making her way in front of Chris to the staircase that Stevie and Leon came up from, "Follow us." Stevie and Mattie caught up with their friend as they led the way, hanging slightly back to stay close to Chris and Leon. "How much do we have between us?" Kate asked in a whisper, "I think I brought about $60 in my wallet today."

"I've got about $50 in the back pocket of my harness." Mattie replied, "I was hoping to get some cool stuff, but given the situation…"

"I've got some money left in my debit account, but I don't think we can afford stopping at an ATM, much less find one that works. And I don't think the Merchant takes plastic, either." Stevie added. "So that makes $110 between us. I'm not sure if that's enough for our guns. And we don't know the exchange rate for pesetas."

"So what do we do? Start looting bodies?" Kate joked.

The group made it downstairs to the lobby when Stevie broke off from the group and walked toward one of the zombies that had been shot down earlier. "What are you-?" Chris asked.

"Looting bodies for money." Stevie explained, searching the zombie's costume pockets. "It was Kate's idea! Aha!" Stevie cheered as she found the dead cosplayer's wallet. "$80! Score!"

Chris looked over at Kate, who merely shrugged. "I didn't think it would be fair for you and Leon to pay for ALL our gear." She said, "Besides, how do we know we have enough money?"

Chris nodded. "Good point." He said, "Alright, you girls can start looting bodies. It's not like these poor people are going to need their money anymore. We'll cover the area. Watch for stragglers." Kate and Mattie nodded and spread out in the lobby.

Mattie picked the corpses that were close to Chris Redfield's position, whereas Kate was feeling a little braver and started on the bodies that were farther away. Kate kicked each of the corpses gently to make sure it was positively dead before settling to work. "That's odd." She thought, examining the yellowish goo that covered the floor where the corpse's head would be, "This one doesn't look like a zombie. And judging from the spray pattern and tearing of flesh around its neck…oh snap." Kate gulped and continued her search for the victim's wallet, pulling out $50 before running back to Chris and Leon.

"What's up with you?" Stevie asked Kate when the search party regrouped, "you look like you've seen a ghost."

"I think we've got more than zombies here." Kate whispered low enough to limit Chris and Leon's hearing.

"Plagas?" Stevie asked. Kate nodded quickly. "Crap…"

"I think we should keep this to ourselves for now. Give Chris and Leon less to worry about." Kate advised, "See anything weird?"

"Yeah. Some of the bodies had stab wounds and other knife marks." Stevie commented before hitting realization, "Kate, what if Krauser is somewhere around here as well? What if HE responded to my rant?"

Kate froze. She had already put her friend in enough of a risk while trying to lure out Leon; What if she had gotten her friend captured, or worse? "I... never thought of that." She admitted awkwardly.

"Hey! Why'd we stop?" Chris asked, breaking Kate's thoughts.

"Sorry. Just thinking about something." She replied, looking back at Chris' suspicious face, "Just wondering how all of us will get out of here alive. Anyway, the merchant hall is down here." Kate gestured to the door that led into the hotel's parking garage. Chris checked his position and tried the door, finding it locked. He looked at Leon and nodded before standing to the side if the door.

"You girls stand back." Leon advised, moving to stand in front of the door. "I'm going to kick the door down. Stay there until we tell you it's safe." Kate nodded, pushing her curious friends back as they leaned forward to watch.

Leon signaled to Chris a few times before kicking the door open. Chris filed in after Leon, turning on his emergency flashlight to look around. The darkened garage walkway sloped in a downward incline towards the parking garage. The entrance to the street was closed off. There was a small group of zombies lingering near the guard station, presumably making a meal out of the guard. Leon noted their activity. "Looks safe up here, except for a small cluster of zombies minding their own business." Leon said, the echo bouncing off the concrete walls, "Stay quiet."

The three girls caught up with Chris and Leon. "The vendor's hall is down there." Kate instructed, "You'll know it when you see it."

"Creepy." Mattie commented as she took her usual place next to Chris.

"Oooh~ these acoustics are awesome." Stevie noted, singing a few notes. Leon turned to repeat his warning as Kate rushed over and clamped her friend's mouth shut.

"Are you nuts?" Kate hissed, "You'll attract the zombies to us!"

Stevie shrugged once Kate took her hand off. "Sorry. You know how I get with acoustics." Stevie apologized, "Let's go."

The two agents and the girls continued their journey to the vendor's hall. "Hey, can we loot more of those bodies?" Mattie asked.

"Sure," Chris agreed, sweeping his flashlight around as the group descended, "Just stay in our sight." With Chris' permission, the girls spread out and looted several more bodies, making sure to stay within the light provided by Chris and Leon, returning with equally large amounts of money.

"We're almost there," Kate said as the floor began to even out. Soon a curtained barrier and sets of tables marked the entrance to the vendor's hall. Several tables of merchandise waited just beyond, hopefully joined by the Merchant.

"Okay," Chris said, taking his knife and slicing through the curtain barrier, creating an exit. "Let's go get you girls some weapons."

**A/N: And there is chapter 4, cuz so many of you have requested it. Sadly, my posting rate for this story is going to slow down from here on. Even though I love you readers, I have to catch up with my life outside : Homework, school, college applications, going to sleep at a decent hour!** **I've been able to post this much because I am currently on Thanksgiving break and had a few chapters ready to post. I just started fleshing out chapters beyond this one! So I ask my readers and reviewers to be patient while I write you guys a good, quality piece of fanfiction.**


	5. Chapter 5

**AN: Here you go people, the 5th chapter! We get to see the Merchant man! I have been hard at work finishing and editing chapter 6 and fleshing out the rest of this story.** **The story is going to get MUCH more interesting as it progresses. I might follow a new posting policy, depending how I feel once I've written some more. Schoolwork is lightening up, so I should be able to write more in my spare time (when I'm not playing Zelda: Skyward Sword :P Don't worry. I won't drop this fic.)  
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**Anyway, I want to give a shout-out to my two regular reviewers: haalyle and Experimental Agent 1123****! This chapter is a bit longer than what I've usually put out: 6 pages in Word! I am on a roll! *does happy dance*  
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**Disclaimer: I don't own Resident Evil and its characters and all that jazz, but Stevie, Kate, and Mattie own themselves! Enjoy!**

Leon stepped through the cloth barrier as Chris held the curtain aside, checking the area. "Clear," Leon verified, looking around the garage, "No zombies in sight. Lots of corpses and bullet shells on the ground though."

"Those aren't yours?" Stevie asked as she crept through Chris' escape route. Leon shook his head. "Chris?" The BSAA agent shook his head.

"First time I've been down here." Chris said as he let Kate and Mattie through before letting himself inside the vendor's hall.

"I guess that means we're not alone," Leon stated, scanning the immediate area with his flashlight. "If I'm not mistaken, the merchant should have his blue torch with him. Nevertheless, be careful." The three girls nodded.

The group began their trek through the vendor's hall, walking the aisles of tables. Merchandise was strewn all over the place. Books and figurines that weren't completely bloodied were either knocked on the floor by swarms of escaping cosplayers or stepped on and bent out of shape in the process.

"Hey guys," Kate whispered to Stevie and Mattie, "If we can get out of here alive, I say we come back and take what we want."

"Hello?" Mattie whispered harshly, "That would be stealing!"

"True," Kate said, "But seeing as society is on hold for the moment, I don't think the booth owners are going to miss a few posters or key chains. And after what we're going through, I think we deserve it."

Stevie and Mattie stared at each other for a couple of seconds. Even Kate knew her own sense of morality was questionable at times, but she did have a point.

"Fine. But not until we know we're getting out of this death trap. ALIVE." Stevie agreed.

The group turned into the area of the Vendor's hall known as 'Artist's Alley', where fan artists gathered to hawk the products of their talent. "I think I see him!" Mattie exclaimed, pointing to the glow of blue light dancing on the concrete floor. She started to make a beeline down the hall towards the light, only to be stopped by Leon's hand.

"Wait," Leon said, accompanied by a muffled giggle from Kate, "Let's see if it's really him." Leon walked forward into the hall, checking the blue light's source. Satisfied with his result, he motioned for Chris and the three girls to approach.

The Merchant had commandeered several of the abandoned, empty tables and arranged them into an extended shop. Several types of guns sat on one table, while boxes of ammunition were stacked neatly on top of another table. Under the table behind the merchant were boxes of grenades, organized by type. "Ah, Strangah!" the hooded merchant greeted Leon in his usual gravelly voice, "It's been a while since yah came around!"

"That long?" Leon said in a sarcastic tone as Kate, Mattie, and Stevie approached with Chris following close behind them, "In my opinion it's been too soon."

"Heh heh, you crack me up, Strangah," the Merchant replied. His gaze caught the three girls, "What's this? Yah brought some more Strangahs. Customers, I hope?"

"Yes," Chris said before any of the girls could respond; they were too busy looking at the array of guns the Merchant had displayed. "We need some weapons. Also: Any chance you could keep an eye on these three?" he asked, shifting his weight.

"WHAT?" Mattie objected violently, "You're leaving us behind!"

"! After all we did for you? Jerk!" Stevie added.

"You're ditching us?" Kate said angrily, giving Chris a single dirty look.

"I'm sorry, but it's for the best." Chris apologized with a serious look on his face, "I can't risk civilians getting hurt."

"What the-! Are you serious? Leon, can you help us out here?" Stevie asked. Leon shook his head and didn't speak, much less even look at the girls.

"I'm sorry, but I have to agree with Chris on this one." Leon admitted.

"So, can you keep them here?" Chris asked the Merchant again.

"Ah'm not runnin' a daycare here, Strangah!" the Merchant argued behind one of his tables, "Ah'm a weapons dealah! Now, are yah gonna buy somethin' or not?"

Chris and Leon glanced at each other and sighed. "I guess we don't have much of a choice." Leon said, "You girls are staying with us." All three girls sighed in relief.

"Don't you dare try that again, Redfield," Stevie warned the BSAA agent, "Or so help me I will go ballistic on you."

"Ok, I got it." Chris replied, still receiving nasty glares from both Kate and Mattie, "Now let's get you some weapons."

Merchant chuckled, shoulders heaving under his cloak. "Now we're talkin'. What are yah buyin'?"

"These girls need guns and protective gear." Chris said, pulling out the cash the girls had scraped together from the looted bodies and set it on the table in front of the Merchant. "Here's what we can pay."

The Merchant picked up the bundle of cash and flipped through the bills. "This'll do yah well, dependin' on what they pick out." The Merchant waved the three girls toward him. "Come on now, don't be shy. Let's get yah set up." Stevie, Kate, and Mattie trotted toward the hooded man as he held up a curtain behind him, "Ah keep the good toys back 'ere for safe-keepin'." The three girls ducked below the curtain into the Merchant's den, where stacks of shelves housed more weapons than they could name.

"Whoa," Mattie breathed.

"This is incredible." Stevie commented, spinning around to look at all of the material the Merchant had in stock. Kate leaned in to look at the details on a set of handguns.

"Like what ah 'ave?" the Merchant asked as he entered, closing the curtain behind him. All three girls nodded and murmured. "Heh, heh. Ah thought yah might. Now, from the behavior of yer protectors, ah surmise we should set yah up with protective gear first. Luckily ah got a bunch of bulletproof vests in stock. They work well against melee too." The merchant picked out three vests from a box and tossed them at the girls. "These look like they might be yer size. Try 'em on under yer clothes. Ah'll be talkin' to yer friends out there." The merchant ducked back through his curtain and disappeared. The three girls helped each other put on their protective gear.

"Hey, Is everything going well back there?" Chris ' voice asked through the curtain while Leon held a murmured conversation with the Merchant.

"The vests are a little tight, but they'll work!" Mattie replied for her friends, checking the security of her bulletproof guard as she adjusted her clothes to hide the Kevlar material underneath.

"Can you breathe?" Chris asked.

"Yep! Just fine! We're all decent!" Kate replied this time, murmuring under her breath afterward, "My boobs are gonna be sore later, though."

The Merchant returned through the rip in the curtain. "Right. Ah've been talkin' to the Strangah. He tells me you lot are gonna need some weapons," the Merchant said. Stevie started to speak when the Merchant interrupted her, "Don't talk. Ah know what's best for yah." The merchant mumbled to himself a little before pointing to Mattie.

"You there! Step ovah 'ere. Ah got somethin' for yah!" the merchant said, gesturing for Mattie to come closer.

Mattie stepped forward consciously. "Please don't let him flash me." She prayed.

The Merchant turned to one of his tables and picked up a shotgun. "Yah look like you can handle the recoil of a shotgun. It's got enough power to keep whatevah's chasin' yah at bay." Mattie grinned wildly, eyes fixed on the shotgun. "Ah'll just saw off the muzzle for yah. That'll make it easier for yah to carry around." The merchant turned to a table of machinery and sawed off the long half of the muzzle with a band saw, creating a shrill noise as the three girls covered their ears.

"Is everything okay in there?" Leon shouted from the other side of the curtain.

"Fine!" Stevie shouted back, gritting her teeth at the noise, "We're fine! No mutilations back here!"

The Merchant lifted the shotgun away from the band saw and admired his work. "Here ya go!" he said cheerfully as he handed the now sawed-off shotgun and a box of ammo to an ecstatic Mattie.

"I wanna shotgun." Stevie said under her breath, practically drooling over the shotgun, while Kate gave a low whistle over the Merchant's handiwork.

"Lucky." the quiet girl commented.

"Now where was ah? Ah-ha!" The Merchant said, turning around and pulling down a nice rifle from one of his shelves. "Let's see. Yah look to be focused enough to handle this gun." He gestured to Kate, "It's semi-automatic. Got enough firepower to get a good headshot if yah aim right." The merchant handed the rifle to Kate, who tested the heavy gun's weight in her hands. "Ah've got a strap and a scope fer that gun somewhere around 'ere." The Merchant turned around and shuffled through some more boxes.

"Dang." Stevie said, looking over Kate's rifle, "You guys get nice toys."

"You sure you don't want one for yourself?" Kate asked her friend, holding up the heavy rifle.

"Nah," Stevie said, waving a hand away from her, " You're the better crack shot. And hey, more useful in your hands than mine."

The merchant chuckled again, bringing out a scope, a box of ammo, and a shoulder strap for Kate's rifle. "Ah've already got somethin' in mind for yah. Unless yah think yah have a bettah idea?"

Stevie looked around the small room until her gaze rested on a rusty, antique Red9 handgun. "How about this?" she asked, picking the small gun up.

"Ah ah ah!" The merchant scolded, taking the Red9 in one of his gloved hands, "This 'ere's a collector's item ah don't feel like parting with yet! Not fer sale!" Stevie's face fell in disappointment. The Merchant handed Kate the attachments to the rifle, set the Red9 aside on a table, and picked up a TMP, "Ya got good taste though, but ah recommend this instead." The Merchant handed Stevie the machine pistol and her eyes nearly popped out her head. "It'll do quick, moderate damage if yer in a pinch. Now this thing ain't very stable, so Ah'll give ya a support stock to even dat out." The Merchant instructed.

"Thank you." Stevie squeaked as the Merchant prepared the weapon for her. "Wait a second. " Stevie added as her voice evened out, recalling the possible presence of Plagas, "What about flash grenades? Just in case enemies get a little too close?"

The Merchant stopped what he was doing. "Flash grenades? Dunno why ya need those fer zombies, but go ahead. Take one for each of ya. There should be enough money left ovah aftah ah get yer friends' guns upgraded." The merchant gestured to a box full of flash grenades next to a table. Stevie briskly walked to the box and picked out three of the blue flash grenades.

"Here," she whispered, passing the grenades to Mattie and Kate, "One for each of us if we get cornered by a Plaga." Kate and Mattie took the grenades quietly and attached them to the waistline of their pants, while Stevie hid hers elsewhere on her person.

Five minutes later, the three girls ducked out of the Merchant's back room and rejoined Chris and Leon. The Merchant had finished upgrading the two men's guns and had swept the money under his coat. "You girls ready?" Chris asked. All three girls nodded. "Good. Let's go find out what's causing this outbreak. Hopefully we'll find some allies as well."

"Hey!" Mattie said, getting Chris' attention before he started walking away, "Can Merchant come with us?" she begged.

"Please~?" Stevie pleaded, TMP sitting comfortably at her side. "We'll behave!"

The Merchant chuckled. "Sorry strangahs, but ah've got a store to keep up and running." He apologized, "Ah'm not as young as ah used t' be. Ah'm too old to be chasing zombies!"

"How old is he anyway?" Kate wondered under her breath, but decided against asking once she recalled a more pressing matter. "Er, Mr. Merchant?" she asked cautiously, "Has anyone else been down here besides us? We've seen bullet shells strewn all over the area, and they aren't from Chris or Leon's guns."

"Heh heh. Can't tell ya that, strangah. That would be breachin' Customer-Merchant confidentiality," the Merchant said.

Kate raised an eyebrow. "Did you just make that up?" she asked, suspicious at the sudden excuse. "You did, didn't you?"

"Most likely," Leon commented as he passed Kate, following the rest of the group as they started to journey away from the Merchant's booth, "Come on. We've got a lot of ground to cover."

**AN: Aaaand that's chapter 5! Merchant's accent is so much fun to write! I'll start work on chapter 7 as soon as I get motivation to! (hint hint: click the review button and leave a message.)** **Might post chapter 6 on saturday or around next week, so keep an eye out!**


	6. Chapter 6

**AN: Okay, I've kept my readers waiting long enough. ****Here's chapter 6, as promised! Thee are two reasons this chapter is out this late. **

**1) I kept spazzing out whenever I wrote a certain character. One time I spazzed out so hard that I fell off my bed while I was writing this chapter!(hint: They're from RE4 and it is not Leon)**.

**2) I hit a bit of a wall while finishing chapter 7, mostly cuz I neglected to flesh out how a scene would play out. Also had some issues with writing one character's personality.**

**Anywho, a 'thank you'** **to my reviewers! (My two regulars, haalyle and Experimental Agent 1123!) And one anonymous reviewer by the name of Alex(). If he/she is reading this, to answer your comment, the real Ada and Krauser will be making appearances!** **I just haven't written that far yet.** **:P**

**One question: Can anyone tell me how to track how many views your fic gets? I know there are more than just my reviewers reading this story. If it's a nice number, I'll set more time aside to write chapters, if not, well, my update times will vary as usual. Thankies.  
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**I should stop yammering now.**

**disclaimer: I do not own Resident Evil, or it's characters. Stevie, Mattie, and Kate own themselves, respectively. On with the show!**

The group made their way out of the vendor's hall and back into the main hotel building. Once out of the parking garage, they started to form a plan. The girls explained their hypothesis on the likely presence of more characters from Resident Evil appearing in the hotel.

"Okay." Chris verified, "If your theory is correct, how are we going to find our other allies that may or may not be here?"

"We found Merchant in the most likely place he would be," Stevie explained, letting her inner science geek ramble, "We also found you and Leon in places that you would take if this was one of the Resident Evil games. If the above are true, then there is a strong chance we'll find some allies in befitting locations."

"So where do we start?" Leon asked, taking a seat on the carpeted floor of the hotel for a quick rest. He had discarded his fuzzy jacket somewhere in the hotel because he claimed it "limited his range of movement", much to the dismay of Stevie, Kate and Mattie, which quickly vanished when the three girls noticed how tight Leon's short sleeved shirt was stretched against his abdominal muscles.

"Let's rest and do a little brainstorming first," Kate suggested, slumping down against the wall, "We're all tired from the trip back up." The incline of the parking garage was very unforgiving to the three girls' stamina reserves.

"Agree," Mattie added after taking a drink from her water bottle, "What is the best place to look? I know we should go to the hotel's dining room later, but what do we do after that?"

"Let's think," Stevie said, "Who are we likely to find here? Then we can think about where they would appear."

"Start with main characters." Kate suggested, "If Chris is here, then it is very likely Jill Valentine is wandering around as well." Mattie's face brightened in excitement at the mention of her favorite character. "It's also likely we can find Claire here too, since she was in both Resident Evil 2 and Code: Veronica. Mattie already has an idea where Barry might be."

"Hey, what about Rebecca?" Mattie added, "Think she could be here as well?"

"It's possible," Kate added, considering the probability in her head, "Then again, the story of Resident Evil Zero did focus on her, so it is just as likely she'll appear too."

"Why don't we watch out for Ada as well?" Stevie offered, "Ada is likely to have some information about what's causing this outbreak. And I don't think keeping an eye out for Sheva would hurt, either."

"So we track down all those people. Then what?" Mattie asked from her seat.

"Figure out what's going wrong in this place." Leon suggested, shrugging his muscular shoulders, "Something had to cause the outbreak."

"Exactly," Chris said, laying out a plan, "For now, we'll return to the ballroom and make that our meeting point. Then we split into teams to cover more ground. We can regroup back in the ballroom after two hours. Also, grab any food supplies that you can carry. We need to keep our strength up if we're gonna survive this."

Kate blinked behind her glasses. "Wait. What about enemies?" she queried calmly.

Leon turned to Chris, who nodded from his space on the wall. "We'll cross that bridge when we come to it." Leon decided, "But for now, if you see any potential foes, do not engage them. Let's go."

"But first!" Mattie exclaimed, holding up her bottle of water," A side trip to the dining room!" Chris and Leon looked at the Jill doppelganger with confused looks before shrugging the strange behavior off.

_**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Don't want to write a transition~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**_

Mattie was uncharacteristically excited as the group made their way to the hotel's dining room, which happened to contain a small restaurant. Mattie immediately rushed into the abandoned space, glancing around the room quickly before spotting and pointing to the object of her interest. "FOUND HIM!" the overexcited girl shouted to Chris and her friends. A large figure in the back of the dining room looked up.

"Chris!" Barry exclaimed. The gigantic, bearded man walked up and patted the BSAA agent on the back in a friendly hug. "Long time no see, old friend! Care to enlighten me on what's going on here?"

"There's been some sort of an outbreak. It's like the Mansion incident all over again. We've been looking for survivors." Chris explained as Leon, Kate and Stevie caught up with the group.

"You found them?" Barry asked Chris, raising one eyebrow as he looked at the three girls.

"Actually, we found him." Stevie corrected as she walked past Barry to get to Mattie.

Mattie swelled with pride when her friends clustered around her. "What did I say? I knew he'd be here!" she said excitedly.

"We all thought as much." Kate said under her breath as she watched the two grown men hug it out.

"I hate to break up the bromance," Leon interrupted, prompting muffled laughter from Stevie and Kate, "but we've still got a lot of ground to cover." The two ex-members of S.T.A.R.S. separated.

"I'll take the backseat on this one and let you decide what's best, Redfield." Barry stated, "Your orders?"

Chris thought for a moment. "We should move along. There's plenty of scouting left to do." Chris ordered. Barry and everyone else nodded, walking out of the restaurant. "We'll split into groups once we reach the ballroom."

_**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Don't feel like writing a transition~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**_

Halfway to the ballroom, the group came into one of the many winding hallways of the hotel. "Check the area for supplies." Chris ordered, allowing the group to fan out. Stevie, Kate, and Mattie, feeling more secure with their new guns, gave Chris with some peace of mind in knowing that everyone was armed. The three girls had decided to scout up the hall on their own for a meter or two, guns ready for zombies that got too friendly for comfort.

Stevie stopped in her tracks when she heard a rumbling come from one of the closed rooms. She waited a moment, hoping to hear the noise again and assure herself that it wasn't just her overactive imagination. The rumbling noise happened again, this time even louder than the first. Stevie turned to her friends. "Psst! Kate! Mattie! Stop!" she whispered, focusing her attention on the rumble. "You hear that?" The other girls turned and listened. Sure enough, the struggling noise was heard again. The source was determined to be a supply closet with a solid door. Chris heard the nose as well and moved to meet up with the girls when Barry stopped him.

"Barry?" Chris asked, turning to look at the older man in the eyes.

"Let's see how they work in a cohesive unit." Barry advised, "Figure out their strengths and weaknesses." Chris nodded, watching the girls from afar in case of trouble.

"Whaddaya think?" Stevie asked, standing in front of the closet, arms folded over her chest as the door continued rattling.

Kate crept up and pressed her ear to the door. "There's something alive in there." She said, "And it's tied up or something. Sounds like it doesn't have the thumbs to operate a doorknob. So what do we do?"

"It looks like this door opens towards us…Let's open it." Stevie said, standing on the side of the door opposite Kate. "If it's nasty, we got the guns to take it down." Mattie nodded.

"I volunteer to open the door." Mattie said. Stevie nodded as she and Mattie switched places. Kate moved to stand directly across from Stevie, planning out where the two of them should aim.

"Judging from the amount of force against the door and the presumed size of whatever's in there, the head should fall right about...here." Kate calculated, marking a spot on the carpet. Stevie nodded, aiming her TMP. The two girls signaled Mattie with their eyes. Mattie placed one hand on the doorknob and tested it.

"It's unlocked." She said. Kate and Stevie tensed up, but still put on brave faces for each other's sake and nodded. Mattie sighed deeply, counted off to three with her free hand, and pulled the door open. Kate and Stevie raised their weapons as they followed the body to the ground, only to set them down as the face of a familiar Spaniard looked up at them.

"It's Luis!" Stevie exclaimed as she kneeled down and set her TMP to hang at her side.

Kate set her sniper rifle down as well and followed suit, leaning over him. "He doesn't look too worse for wear." She commented, noticing that his hands were tightly tied together and his mouth was duct-taped shut. "Let me try to get that." Kate reached down and grabbed onto a section of duct tape while Stevie started to work on the bindings on Luis' wrists. "Sorry." Kate apologized right before she ripped the tape off of Luis' face.

"Gah! Ahh, ladies. To what do I owe the pleasure?" Luis asked, his accent making Kate's legs wobbly.

"You jumped out of a closet at us." Stevie explained, "We let you out." A dazed look crossed Luis' face.

"Is he okay?" Kate asked as she and Stevie leaned over him.

Mattie shifted uncomfortably. "Hey, guys. You realize he's getting a full view of ….ballistics, right?" she asked, noticing where Luis' eyes were looking, "Pervert."

Kate blushed heavily and pulled away from the Spaniard. Stevie stood up indignantly and begrudgingly helped Luis up to his feet.

"You girls wouldn't happen to smoke, do you?" Luis asked. All three of the girls shook their heads. "I thought not."

"Nice try, Casanova." Stevie said sarcastically before finding the men at the other side of the hall. "Chris! Leon! We found someone!" she hollered. Leon came running from the area Chris and Barry were checking.

"Luis," Leon said upon arrival, pronouncing Luis' first name wrong, much to Stevie's chagrin, "Fancy seeing you here. I thought you were dead."

"His name is Luis!" Stevie seethed under her breath; she had to listen to Leon mispronounce the name several times in Resident Evil 4. Gods forbid she had to listen to him mispronounce it in real life as well!

Luis laughed. "I guess Lady Luck has a couple of soft spots for guys like myself," The Spaniard said, "Speaking of ladies, who are these girls? More hostages you rescued?"

"They're survivors of the outbreak." Leon explained, "They're trying to help us figure out what happened here."

"Aah. I thought they were too cute to get in all this trouble by themselves." Luis said as he looked at the three girls in turn, "Wait, who is 'us'?"

"Some allies." Leon added, "We're going to find some more backup before trying anything big."

Luis shrugged and shook his head, making his long, wavy hair fly around his face. "Can't argue with that." He said. Leon turned around and rejoined Chris and Barry. Luis turned back to the girls and smiled charmingly, "Senoritas." The three girls walked past the Spaniard to regroup with Leon, Chris and Barry. Kate took care to turn her face away from Luis so he wouldn't see the blush on her face, not just because she was embarrassed; the girl would be struck with overwhelming shyness whenever around somebody she admired. Stevie rolled her eyes and giggled silently at the womanizing Spaniard, taking precautions not to look Luis directly in the eyes. Mattie simply shrugged at her friends' odd behavior and walked ahead of Stevie and Kate, directing them back to Chris and Barry.

Slowly but surely, the group of survivors made its way back to the ballroom that Chris and the girls started from. Mattie recalled which of the two doors into the ballroom had been left un-barricaded and opened it cautiously, in case some zombies had wandered inside. Luckily, there were none. Mattie held the door open as the crew of survivors entered the ballroom.

"Right." Chris started, as he stopped in the center of the room, the rest of the party forming a circle. "Let's split into groups from here. We can cover more ground as we search for allies."

"Question." Kate said, raising her hand, "Who's going with whom?"

Chris looked at the gathering of people and thought hard. "Barry. You keep an eye on Stevie. Take the section of conference rooms that are nearby." Chris instructed, pointing Stevie out to the former S.T.A.R.S. member. "Leon, take Kate and Luis with you. Check the main lobby and the area surrounding it." Leon nodded in approval. Kate nodded too, but still couldn't look Luis in the face when the Spaniard made an attempt to strike up a conversation to her.

"Shy one, are you?" Luis said coyly, sneaking up behind Kate, making her jump when he spoke, "We'll fix that." Kate turned away from Luis wordlessly so he wouldn't see her bright pink face.

"As for myself, I'll take Mattie with me to explore the far section of conference rooms I saw earlier." Chris stated, causing Mattie to squeak in glee beside him. "We'll meet back here in two hours. Agreed?" Everyone agreed to Chris' plan. The teams exited the ballroom and split up, wishing each other good luck before heading onward for their respective missions.

**AN: Well, that's that. The survival group has two new allies: Barry Burton and Luis Sera! Before I forget, note to self: Include at least one sandwich joke. Wait a minute, I did that back in chapter 1! ;D Haha! But there may be more. In the meantime, please hit that shiny review button, and wait patiently for the next chapter. I'm outlining these suckers while I'm at school, so I'm working pretty hard on not running into more writer's blocks.** **Because I love my readers/reviewers. 3**


	7. Chapter 7

**AN: Hi peoples! I'm almost about done with chapter 8 I think, so I'll let you have this one early. I only got one review for the last chapter, what up with that? :S I understand if my regulars are on vacation and don't have Internet service, but seriously, what gives?**

**There's something I've been noticing recently. The RE section of has an insane amount of RE4 self-inserts. Not that I don't like RE4 or self-insert stories in general, (I've played through RE4 at least four times, I know the story and game inside out) but the idea is getting…. old. Every time I see a new one pop up, it bugs me. That concept is not original anymore, and it gets boring reading stories with the same events happening in each one. Get my drift? **

**I kinda wish there were more RE5 self-inserts. It'd be a change from all the RE4 stuff, for sure. I'm gonna go look for those while people enjoy this chapter.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Resident Evil. Non-canon characters own themselves. Dong ma?**

~~~~~~~Team Chris ~~~~~~~~~~

Jill Valentine worked furiously at the locked door with her tools. She had been aimlessly wandering around a hotel infested with zombies far longer than she liked. The brunette achingly wanted a place to rest for a few hours and recover her thoughts. But the door was being stubborn and didn't want to open. Lucky her.

She heard a slow set of footsteps clumping up her hallway. Jill set her tools aside and pulled out her handgun, aiming for the corner of the hallway. She wasn't afraid of the zombies anymore, but it was Jill's creed that she should be ready for any enemy. A set of shadows appeared on the wall. "I know you're there." Jill declared, "Friend or foe?" She had taken enough emotional trauma during her episode in Africa; Jill would be damned if she fell into that routine again.

The two shadows stopped in their tracks. "Friends." A male voice said. Jill lowered her handgun.

"Chris?" she asked, recognizing the voice's owner, "What are you doing here?" Chris revealed himself, stepping of the wall. Mattie peeked around to watch the exchange, since Chris' gigantic figure took up the better part of the hall.

"Almost the exact same thing as you, really." Chris replied as Jill Valentine stood up from her crouching position, showing off her light blue BSAA fatigues, lock-picking tools forgotten on the carpet.

"It's good to see you here, Chris." Jill said, placing her handgun back in its holster and settling her hands on her hips. Jill looked at Mattie. "Who's this?"

"A survivor. She and her friends found me in the early stages of the outbreak. Her friends are currently with some of our allies, looking for the rest of us." Chris explained.

"Hi!" Mattie said happily, smiling at her counterpart, "I'm Mattie."

Jill smiled at Mattie. "Nice to meet you. Jill Valentine." Jill greeted before turning to look back up at Chris. "Shall we keep moving?" Chris nodded, and the two BSAA agents began walking up the hall that Chris arrived through. Once the agents caught up with Mattie, Jill finally noticed the similarities between their attire. She raised an eyebrow and turned to Chris, who answered her question before Jill could even start.

"Don't panic," Chris said, explaining Capcom's intentions to Jill, "These girls apparently look up to us."

"Is that right?" Jill asked rhetorically, feeling a little flame of pride swell in her chest, "Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, after all." A grinning Mattie could barely hold a fangirly shriek to herself as her team migrated to another section of the hall.

~~~~~Team Leon~~~~~~~~

Leon lead the way as his search team observed the immediate area. There had been a few zombies, but Leon's handgun had taken them out quickly. Kate followed close to Leon, watching his blind spot. Luis took on the job of rear security. Kate still didn't try to speak to Luis, her shyness overtaking he every time she even though about it. Soon after leaving the ballroom, the team had found the cluster of rooms they were supposed to search. Leon motioned for Luis and Kate to wait outside the door.

"Wait out here." Leon advised, "I'll tell you if it's bad. Then you can help out." Luis and Kate nodded. Leon carefully opened the door and entered the room.

"This room was meant for some sort of panel." Leon surmised as he walked up an aisle that split several rows of chairs, leading up to a dais at the end of the room. He scanned the area, his eyes landing on a female figure with familiar auburn-brown hair and that was stretched out over a row of chairs. Leon advanced carefully. Upon reaching the figure, it was revealed to be the resting body of someone he met in Raccoon City. Leon reached a gloved hand downward and shook the person lightly.

"Claire. Wake up. It's me Leon." Leon whispered, nudging the younger Redfield awake. Leon immediately thanked his lucky stars that Claire didn't have one hand on her handgun or was a light sleeper, otherwise Leon would have been in trouble.

"Leon?" Claire asked, turning over and looking up at the ex-cop, "When did you get here?"

"I could ask the same thing." Leon stated, holding out a hand to help her up. Claire accepted the assistance and pulled herself out of her makeshift cot, fixing her ponytail before brushing off her jeans and red vest out of habit.

Claire sighed, "This place is a complete mess. I don't even know how I got here." Claire looked down to the side in contemplative thought, "At least there's a friendly face."

"Chris is here too. Along with Barry and maybe some other friends of ours." Leon added. He also explained the situation with Capcom to Claire, mentioning the survivors that found Chris and himself.

Outside, Luis was getting bored of waiting for Leon to finish searching. Kate wouldn't speak a word to him, and even then would only provide glances at him quickly before providing him with a terse answer to any questions he asked. "You don't talk much, do you?" Luis tried after multiple attempts of getting the teenager to talk in something other than monosyllabic words.

"Yeah," Kate replied, keeping her eyes on the mottled ceiling, attempting to form shapes out of the plaster.

Luis laughed a little. "I thought as much." The Spaniard finally leaned into the doorway, looking into the room and seeing Leon talking with Claire. "How does he do it?" Luis asked under his breath before shouting, "Leon! Is it safe in there?"

Inside, Leon turned toward the doorway, making eye contact with Luis. "It's safe. We found someone." Leon and Claire came out of the room. Claire looked over to her right and made eye contact with a surprised looking Kate.

"You must be one of the survivors. I'm Claire." Claire said, trying to be friendly. Kate nodded. "But judging from Leon's explanation, you must already know who I am. What's your name?"

Kate nodded again before replying, giving Claire her name.

"Come on, let's go. We still have some ground to cover." Leon said as he walked out of the panel, making his way to the entry of yet another hall, which to Kate's knowledge, lead to the lobby where she and her friends had attracted Leon with 'Ada's' ranting.

"So he must have been wandering around here before we found him." Kate thought as she followed Leon, only to fall back a few steps to walk beside Claire. Claire noticed her new company and decided to attempt another conversation.

"I like your vest." Claire tried, noticing that Kate had dressed up as her for this convention that Leon had talked about. "Did you make it?"

Kate brightened up quickly, smiled, and began talking softly. "Yep. It took the better part of two weeks, but I sewed it myself. I even painted the design and words on the back."

"Wow," Claire said, continuing the conversation, "I could never sew to save my life."

"It takes practice." Kate commented. The girl blinked as a thought came to her. She held a hand up to the top of her head and compared her height to Claire's. "What do you know? We ARE the same height." Kate added.

Luis once again had taken to the back of the pack, where he could subtly check out Claire without her noticing. He and also taken note of the short, yet animated conversation. "Ay, what gives?" he sighed, catching the attention of the two women," I try to talk to the senorita and she clams up, yet you two chicas are holding a conversation like it's nothing! Where's the love?"

Claire scoffed. "Maybe you'd have better luck if you look at their eyes while you're talking," Claire said sarcastically, turning her head to look back at Luis.

The Spaniard stopped in his tracks, grasping his chest pretending to be mortally injured. "You wound me, chica." Luis replied pathetically, giving the two girls his "pity face". The two girls ignored him and continued walking along, holding a light conversation between them. Luis could only gape in disappointment and soothe his poor ego. "I must be losing my touch with the ladies." He thought as he followed Leon and the two women to the next area they were assigned to investigate.

~~~~~Team Barry~~~~~~~

Barry and Stevie were patrolling the far hallway, trying each of the doors, shooting the doors that were locked, ad picking up food supplies for later. Stevie had taken one side of the hall, testing the doors and poking her head into each room, checking for zombies before investigating the room further for supplies. Up till recently, Stevie had been faced with a row of doors that had been locked tightly, so her excited surprise at the next unlocked door was a welcome change from frustration.

"Hey, this one's unlocked!" Stevie said before pushing the door all the way open, only to be met with a spray of greenish mist directly into her face. "SON OF A-! AGGH! WHAT IS THIS IT STINGS! Right in my flipping corneas! Mother of god, it burns!" Stevie complained, covering her face as her eyes watered furiously, in an effort to rid her eyes of the foreign substance.

"You're normal?" a young woman's voice shouted in apology, "I'm SO sorry! I thought you were one of them!"

Barry appeared behind Stevie, gun ready to find the attacker. "Rebecca!" Barry said, putting his magnum away in its holster and walking past Stevie, "You're here too?"

Rebecca nodded, putting the canister of first aid spray back in her belt. "I found myself in this hotel and hid in here for cover. I'm not entirely sure what happened before that." The medic explained.

"OW! Do you have ANY idea how painful this is?" Stevie agonized, blinking through watery eyes at the medic.

"Sorry." Rebecca replied shyly, "I-it should clear up soon, really."

"Alright. Rebecca," Barry said, looking up from his wristwatch, turning the teenage medic's attention to him, "It's almost time to regroup with the Chris and the others. We've been out for nearly two hours."

Stevie nodded in understanding, bravely removing her hand away from her stinging, waterlogged eyes. "Ok." Rebecca replied, before turning to Stevie. "I'm REALLY sorry for spraying you in the face, uhhh…" Rebecca trailed, not knowing her victim's name.

"Stevie." Stevie introduced herself, drying her eyes with a stray napkin she had found next to the water table, still slightly annoyed at being sprayed in the face as she moved toward the door, "Apology accepted. Let's get out of here."

~~~~~~~Team Chris~~~~~~~

"This must be the interior perimeter!" Mattie said as she turned a corner into a hall that was completely covered with blood-smeared windows on one side. A small amount of light streamed through the glass, casting shadows as the team ventured through the hallway. "I can't believe it's still daylight."

"Looks like the zombies have made their way through here." Jill observed as she walked down the hall, "At least the carpet is relatively clean."

"Relatively clean to what?" Chris joked. Since he had found his old partner, Chris' personality and sense of humor had lightened up considerably. Jill elbowed her partner lightly and smirked.

The team continued their trek down the hall, only to be stopped by Chris when he heard footsteps coming up the hall in front of them. There was nowhere to take cover, so Chris and Jill pulled out their handguns. Mattie started to raise her shotgun when Chris stopped her.

"Save your ammo for close encounters." He advised, "Get behind us. We're trusting you to watch our backs." Mattie felt a little indignant, but honored by the fact that Chris and Jill trusted her to be their cover. Chris and Jill trained their handguns on the space where the hall turned a corner, while Mattie turned her head and watched from behind the two BSAA members. The two agents were prepared to fire at what they presumed was an approaching B.O.W., when the source of the steps marched around the corner, providing a welcome surprise in the form of Sheva Alomar.

"Chris! Jill!" the African BSAA agent greeted, lowering her gun, "It's good to see you alive."

Jill nodded to Sheva in acknowledgement. "Likewise. This place is a wreck." Chris replied, lowering his handgun, "We've been looking for allies and other survivors."

"Survivors?" Sheva repeated curiously. Mattie leaned outward from behind Jill and waved.

"Hello!" Mattie said excitedly. There were now three BSAA agents in her team; Mattie would most likely explode from pure, unadulterated joy if her team managed to find another ally.

Chris checked his wristwatch, noticing that it was almost time for the search parties to regroup. "We'll explain more on our way back to the meeting point," he said, holstering his handgun, "Come on."

~~~~~Team Leon~~~~~~~~~

Leon's team found their way back to the lobby where Chris and the girls had found Leon; the check-in desks were nearby. "Spread out." Leon ordered, "Tell the nearest teammate if you find someone." Each member of "Team Leon" agreed with the order and dispersed around the area. Luis volunteered to cover Claire right off the bat, leaving the younger Redfield to roll her eyes and start searching one end of the hotel. Leon had taken the opposite corner of the lobby, leaving Kate to look for the check-in desks. "There's bound to be something useful there." He said, and Kate believed him.

Kate spun around 360 degrees, scanning the immediate area for the check-in desks. "I think they're supposed to be by the elevators across from the doors." She thought, recalling her mental map of the hotel. She was able to locate the doors that lead into the hotel from the street. From there, Kate was able to find the check-in desks tucked away in an alcove just off the lobby alongside the elevators. The rifle-bearing girl made her way to the check-in desks when she saw a familiar figure. Kate's shyness took over once again as she hid against one of the walls that adjoined the alcove to the rest of the lobby. She peeked around the corner, observing the figure behind the row of desks, before whipping her head back. "It has to be Ada Wong! Why did I want to look around on my own?" she mentally berated herself, "Curse my shyness!"

Kate peeked past the wall again. Sure enough, the red-clad femme fatale was leaning over one of the computers, presumably looking over some piece of information. "I've got to get her on our side." Kate thought, "Otherwise Stevie and Mattie are not going to let me live it down."

Kate summoned up what bravery she had and stepped off of the wall, showing herself to Ada. "Er, hello?" she said awkwardly. Ada looked up from what she was doing.

"Can I help you?" Ada asked in a monotone voice, slightly annoyed at the disruption in her task.

Kate started on her answer, but unfortunately the poor girl's brain realized that THE Ada Wong was speaking to her, thus rendering Kate absolutely tongue tied. "Well, I- curses, you see, grrr.." Kate stuttered incoherently, stumbling over words whilst Ada stared at her expectantly. Kate took a deep breath before trying again. "I WAS SENT TO LOOK FOR YOU." The Claire copy managed to say clearly, speaking loudly in order to convey her purpose to the spy. Ada looked back up at her.

"And who sent you, exactly?" Ada said cautiously, reaching one hand for her handgun, in case Kate proved to be an enemy to her.

Kate gulped, scared to have Ada's sharp eyes focused solely on her. "Please do not let her shoot me I'm too young to die." Kate thought rapidly as her knees buckled together in worry. "Well, I was sent by-" she started, only to be interrupted from the lobby.

"Kate?" Leon shouted, coming toward the nervous girl, "Have you found something?" Leon stopped right next to her, seeing Ada behind the reception desks. "Ada! Thank goodness we found you." Leon said in relief.

Ada relaxed a little but didn't loosen her grip on the handgun, which she kept hidden behind the counter, turning her eyes to the government agent. "Leon. Care to tell me why you're here?" she said, hiding the threatened tone in her voice. The elevators were out of commission; Kate and Leon had blocked her only escape path, and Ada didn't have the foresight to carry a pair of exploding sunglasses with her other tools.

"We're searching for allies and other survivors," Leon explained, "Apparently some wormhole brought us to the hotel." Leon paused before continuing, "Ada. We need your help if we want to determine the cause of this outbreak. It'll be safer if we stick together, too."

"Why ask me?" Ada objected, "You know I prefer to work alone, Leon. I don't do well with teamwork."

Leon tried a new track. "The more people we have looking, the more likely we're going to find the answers." He reasoned, "Please, Ada." Kate stood by the agent quietly, holding her sniper rifle at her side and welcoming the excuse to not speak. Goodness knows if she tried to convince Ada to come with them, she'd probably end up making it worse. Damn shyness.

Ada considered Leon's offer, looking downward at the desk before replying, "… you say you've already found some allies?" Both Leon and Kate nodded. "Very well. I'll follow you, but don't expect me to get along with everybody."

Kate let out a massive sigh she didn't know she was holding, slouching her shoulders in the process. "Fair enough," Leon agreed. "Kate," Leon ordered, "Check behind the counter and see if there isn't anything we can use later. There's bound to be something."

Kate nodded and jogged around the row of desks until she reached the section that Ada was standing. She saw the double agent subtly close a file and tuck it away as she slid her handgun back into its though holster. Kate raised an eyebrow at the action, but dismissed it as she scanned the row of desks, and upon finding nothing, tried the desk drawers, which proved to be locked tight.

"Allow me." Ada said smoothly as she moved in front of the drawer, picking the lock easily and opening it. Kate looked inside the drawer to find several sets of radios, charged and ready.

"Wow. Jackpot." Kate whispered before realizing how close Ada was standing to her and clamming up again.

"Did you find something?" Leon asked from his position in the doorway.

Kate plucked up the courage to speak again, trying not to think of her close proximity to Ada Wong. "Yeah. We found a whole deck of radio units in here." She replied calmly.

Leon nodded in approval. "Good. We'll take those with us when we head back to the ballroom. But first, we tell Claire and Luis that's it's about time to head back." Leon said, mispronouncing Luis' name wrong again as he began to walk away.

Kate crouched down and gathered up the radio units. "It's Luis, moron." She said grumbled angrily, loud enough for Ada to hear. Once she had gathered the radio units, the group backtracked their way to the ballroom with the red-clad operative begrudgingly keeping the pace behind them.

**AN: Aaand done! Hot damn, over three thousand words this chapter! We got a lot more characters to work with! Stevie really got the short end of the stick in this chapter. XD**

**Speaking of which, how's my characterization? Did I mess anybody up? Any advice for this humble writer? Review!**


	8. Chapter 8

**AN: A little story on what inspired this fanfic! Way, way back before I started writing my own fics, I noticed a pattern. No matter the series, there were always a couple of fics where the characters would appear in a fan's house & vice versa! These got old and unoriginal rather quickly. Then one day I saw a fanfic where a subgroup of characters from an anime/manga find themselves dropped right smack dab in the middle of an anime convention! I liked that idea! As I continued reading & keeping up with fan fiction, I noticed there weren't many fanfics with that idea, so I thought, "A Resident Evil story with this plot device sounds believable and legit!" And thus this fanfic was spawned in my brain! Before I started writing, I did some research while I was at my local anime convention (if you call over the nearest state border LOCAL,) and fleshed out the general plot and some mental notes. ( general layout, where to hide, etc. etc.) Afterward, I started writing this fanfic. So now you know how this story came about.**

**Insert the usual disclaimer: I no own ResEvil. Not get money for idea. Non-canon charries own themselves.**

Team Leon had made it back to the ballroom first, followed shortly by Team Chris. Claire had been overjoyed to see her brother, giving each other a tight bear hug once they reunited. After that, the teams drifted into sparse clusters, holding their own side conversations while they waited for the last search party to reappear. The ballroom doors creaked open as Team Barry re-entered the ballroom, causing Chris and several other Resident Evil characters turned to look at the returning platoon.

"We made it!" Stevie said tiredly as she walked in, holding her TMP to the side, "Didn't want anybody starting a party without us!" Barry and Rebecca followed behind the Ada Wong look-alike, closing the ballroom doors and barricading them with chairs.

"Who'd you find?" Chris asked, "Anyone else out there we should know about?"

Barry shook his head as he placed the last chair in front of the double doors. "Just Rebecca, and a reasonable amount of supplies." The older man reported, "No enemies to speak of."

"Good," Jill replied, "The medic is one of the most valuable members of a team." Rebecca smiled at her old friend.

When the two ex-S.T.A.R.S members joined the three BSAA agents in conversation, Stevie glanced around at everyone before waltzing over to the far side of the ballroom where Kate and Mattie were standing. "Hey! You're back!" Mattie greeted as Stevie came close to her.

Kate turned her head to look at her friend, noticing something was off. "You okay?" she asked, full of concern, "Your eyes are kinda red."

Stevie breathed in before speaking, "I got sprayed in the face, by REBECCA." She said, speaking loud enough for the medic to hear and flinch in guilt while Chris winced, recalling the incident in the mansion when Rebecca sprayed HIM in the face, "Don't get it in your eyes. It hurts like a mother." Stevie advised, "At least you guys have glasses."

"Ow," Both Kate and Mattie commented, wincing under their breath.

Not too far off, Ada and Leon were holding their own hushed conversation, mostly Leon telling Ada what had happened before the search team discovered her. Ada listened and nodded, adding her own questions when it felt appropriate. "I take it those three are survivors as well as doppelgangers?" the spy asked curiously, looking at the three girls out of the corner of her vision.

"Exactly," Leon explained, "They're the ones who saw the outbreak start and managed to ride it out for a while before they found Chris and myself."

"I see," Ada commented, scanning Stevie's dress. "Not as exact as I hoped, but it'll have to make do."

Stevie heard this comment and felt the need to reinforce her dignity as she looked back at her counterpart and responded, "Hey! I'm on a budget! What were you expecting?" Stevie turned back to her friends, dropping the matter. "I need to get a drink of water. I've got a REALLY bitter taste in my mouth!" She said as she began walking to the nearest water cooler and raised her voice in emphasis, which caused poor Rebecca to wither in guilt on the other side of the room.

"Everyone! Gather around!" Chris said loudly, calling everyone to the center of the ballroom. Once a circle had been formed, Chris continued, "The next thing we should do is look for clues as to how the outbreak began."

"We saw the first zombie wandering around the convention. He bit somebody, and then shit hit the fan." Kate explained calmly, stretching her arms out in front of her as her adrenaline wore off.

"True, but how did the virus make it's way into the convention? I propose we split up again." Chris stated as Stevie reappeared with a paper cup full of water. She had just started to take a sip when she pulled a spit-take at Chris' suggestion, somehow managing not to spray water all over the front of her dress in the process.

"Are you high off of green herbs?" Stevie interjected, gesturing wildly with her hands in emphasis, "Splitting up leads to BAD. Any episode of Scooby-doo will tell you that much."

"I think he meant splitting up into search teams again, silly." Mattie explained sarcastically.

Kate nodded before tossing her two cents in. "There's no reason for any of us to search our own when we have…" Kate paused, counting off the number of their new allies on her fingers, "Thirteen of us in one place! Plus three, of course." She shot a subtle glare of annoyance at Chris; she hadn't quite forgiven him for trying to leave her and her friends behind with the Merchant. Not that there was anything wrong with the foreign weapons dealer…

"So how do we split up the teams?" Sheva asked, holding one hand on her hip.

Kate pulled out a stray notepad and pen she had snagged from the reception desks and sat on the carpet, Stevie and Mattie following suit. "Plan A: We split into three teams of four people each and work our way up. We'll figure out how to balance the teams from there."

"Sounds good to me." Leon said, nodding along with many of the other Resident Evil characters.

"What if we run into… intelligent enemies? Theoretically speaking?" Rebecca asked nervously.

Kate pondered the medic's question, pen hovering over the paper, "Yes, 'what if?' I've got a couple of ideas: Should Mattie, Stevie, and I be on the same team with our counterparts, or be separate from them? What would cause more confusion?"

"I think separate teams might work better. It would throw our enemies off if they saw two of us in separate areas." Claire reasoned, "And it would be a bit more confusing than if somebody saw near carbon copies of ourselves standing next to each other."

"Oh! If we are on separate teams than our designated character, if the same enemy runs into different teams and see us, he'll get confused!" Stevie said as she interpreted the logic behind the idea.

Mattie nodded. "Yeah! That'll definitely mess them up!" she approved. Kate made a note on the pad and looked back up at the circle in front of her.

"Right. I also think it would be a good idea to put people that have worked together in the past on the same teams as well." Jill suggested, "That way the team members already know they can trust each other."

Kate nodded. "Good idea." She said, making another note before drawing up a chart showing the links between various characters. "Anything else?"

"I want Chris on my team." Mattie chirped, smiling from ear to ear.

Kate stared at her friend for a moment before writing Chris' name on her pad of paper. "I can arrange that." She said.

"Yay!" Mattie chirped again in glee.

Kate muttered to herself as she wrote names down in each team's column. The Resident Evil characters watched her closely as she assigned them to a search party. After a minute or two, she dropped the pen on the carpet and shared the results.

"How about this? Team Mattie gets Chris, Sheva, and Rebecca. Both Chris and Mattie are heavy hitters; I have a feeling they're going to need a bit of patching up later, and Sheva has well-balanced skills." She explained, causing Mattie to squeak in glee. Rebecca looked at the hyperactive Jill clone weirdly before determining that there was actually nothing wrong with her head.

"Team Stevie has Leon, Claire, and Luis. Leon and Claire have worked together in the past, and so have Leon and Luis. The whole team is fairly balanced, so it works out." Kate said, pointing to each member of the team with one finger.

"Alright," Stevie thought, nodding in approval and glancing around at her new teammates, "I can work with this. Luis, my eyes are up here, you womanizer. It's the dress, isn't it? Oh well. I least I got two good-looking guys. Leon's okay, but he's not the brightest bulb in the drawer. I can count on both Leon and Luis' gun skills, but they gotta peel their eyes off of Claire before that. I can trust Claire to wield a gun, as long as she's willing to work with us. You know what? She can have Leon; that Spaniard is mine! But why do I feel an odd sense of foreboding…?"

"And my team gets Jill, Barry, and Ada. Barry and Jill are on the same team cause of their time in S.T.A.R.S, but I didn't have anywhere else to put Ada without unbalancing the teams, so she's with my team as well." Kate added, "Any objections?"

The members of the Resident Evil cast conferred with each other in murmured undertones. "This'll work," Kate thought nervously, reassuring herself as she set the notepad aside, "I'll just have to work on opening up to Ada. Cursed shyness."

"Sounds like a plan. What areas should we cover?" Jill asked.

Kate blinked in surprise. She hadn't expected everyone to agree so quickly. "Let's see, Team Mattie, take the garages and mechanical rooms. See what can be found and wipe out any zombies that might linger. My team will take floors 3 to 14. Team Stevie can take floors 15 through 29. We'll meet up and finish with the 30th floor and the roof once we're done with those. If something goes wrong, we meet back at the first floor lobby that's outside here."

"Wait, How will we know if something DOES go wrong?" Chris added, a hint of severity to his voice.

"We found a bunch of radios when our search team located Ada." Leon explained, "There should be enough to go around for each team." Kate stood up and walked around with a tote bag full of the communication devices, handing one to each person in the room.

"Good. We'll start out in five minutes." Chris said as Kate vacated the circle, excusing people to wander around and catch up with their new teams, as well as take care of… basic needs before they had to leave the safety of the ballroom.

"That's strange." Kate said under her breath as she felt around the bag to claim a radio for herself when she was done, "I thought there was one more." There had been an even amount of walkie-talkie units behind the reception desks, but now there was one missing from the bag. Kate looked to the area where she had set the bag down to wait for the others. "I know I set the bag over there. Everyone was in the circle, so nobody could have touched it." She thought, squinting to see into one of the darkened corners of the ballroom, "I must be psyching myself out again. We would have heard another person come in here." Kate sighed, shrugged her shoulders, and tried to turn her thoughts away from the missing radio unit.

Ada noticed Kate's worried body language and wandered over to her, holding out her own radio unit. "Here," the spy offered, "I don't think I'll be using mine much." Kate looked up, considering the Asian operative's offer, before accepting the radio.

"Thanks." Kate said softly, attempting to hide her neuroticism from Ada's keen sense of perception.

Ada nodded. "I assume you and your friends are close?" she asked, casting a glance to Stevie and Mattie, who were still talking with the others.

Kate nodded. "We've known each other for a long time," she said, gazing off into a corner. As long as she didn't make eye contact with the spy, she could talk to Ada without becoming increasingly shy. "In the time that we've known each other, we haven't fought at all. We share common interests. No particular pet peeves. We treat each other like sisters and watch out for each other's backs." Kate explained, "But, we still have some secrets."

"Really?" Ada said, raising an eyebrow, "Like what?"

Kate paused, choosing her words carefully as she looked at Ada through the corner of her eyes, "Stevie and I have a few emotional scars. I'm not going to say exactly what they are, but it makes us all the more protective of each other, especially Mattie. As far as I know, she hasn't experienced anything like that, so Stevie and I want to look out for her even more so." She said solemnly, pausing again, "I think I may have said too much."

Ada turned away. "Very well." She said before leaving Kate to be alone with her thoughts. "These three girls might be vital to forwarding our cause." Ada thought as she reconciled the priorities of her mission.

Meanwhile, Stevie had gathered by her new team, waiting to leave and shoot up some zombies with her new TMP.

"You think you're gonna be okay out there? You don't look so well." Leon asked, noticing Stevie's irritated eyes and hoping that she hadn't been bitten.

"Oh no, Mr. Kennedy. At this rate, I'm probably not going to get sick for the next twenty years, thanks to that cloud of first aid spray I INHALED." Stevie said loudly with a smug grin as she watched Rebecca's reaction.

"You're not mad at Rebecca, are you?" Claire questioned, leaning over to talk to Stevie "She's a perfectly nice girl from what I know. She probably didn't mean to spray you in the face."

Stevie chuckled before she decided to respond, "Mad? I stopped being angry with her once my eyes stopped burning. I'm just messing with her now!"

"Okaaaay then." Claire said slowly as she leaned back into a regular standing position, "What about your friends? Do you mess with them as well?"

"Of course I do! That's part of the job description." Stevie exclaimed.

Claire laughed. "So, what are Kate and Mattie like?" she asked lightly, "I know Kate's the quiet one, and Mattie seemed excited to see everybody."

Stevie shrugged; why not? "Mattie's pretty free-spirited and excitable as far as people go. Kate's got the lion's share of brains, but she's just as prone to mistakes as the rest of us. Oh, and it takes a while for her to open up and talk to people; she's not always that quiet."

Claire nodded. "I see," she replied, "Now when is Luis going to come out of the bathroom?"

"He's probably fixing his stubble." Stevie joked as Luis walked out of the bathroom towards them, "Speak of the devil."

"Ladies, been thinking about me?" Luis said, posing as he stopped in front of them.

"No." Stevie said, causing Claire to burst into muffled giggles as Luis' face fell.

Near another set of doors, Mattie was waiting next to Sheva and Rebecca. "Hey, Chris is the only guy on his team," Mattie thought, as she watched Chris and Jill hold a conversation from afar, "I wonder if Jill's feeling a little bit jealous."

"Be careful, alright?" Chris asked his partner and best friend.

"As long as you do the same yourself." Jill said, leaning over to catch Mattie watching them. "Looks like your other partner, the medic, and my clone are waiting on you, tough guy. Don't get carried away Romeo." Jill teased before walking away to organize her own team. Chris chuckled at the joke before striding over to his patiently waiting team.

"Are we all set?" he asked as he approached. Sheva and Mattie nodded, while Rebecca looked like she was having second thoughts.

"Now that I think about it," Rebecca said, "I need to make a trip to the bathroom!" Chris excused her and she ran off to the ladies' room in a rush. Chris turned to Mattie.

"Barry and I were watching when you girls found Luis. You work well together." Chris commented as Sheva checked her handgun.

Mattie nodded. "We act like one big family. Kate's the oldest, I'm in the middle, and Stevie's the youngest."

"Nice." Chris said, "From what I've seen, you three seem to share personality quirks with your counterparts."

"Yeah," Mattie agreed, "I've got a bit of Jill's tenacity, not to mention lock-picking skills. Kate's usually pretty relaxed, but she means business when things get tough; sorta like your sister. As for Stevie… she plays by her own rules. We don't really know that much about Ada, so it's kinda hard to compare the two. "

At that point, Rebecca came running over to rejoin her team. "I'm back!" she called.

"Right. Let's get a move on." Chris said, before he turned to the other two squads. "Time to head out!" he ordered, "If all goes well, we regroup on the twenty-ninth floor before taking on the thirtieth!" Chris and Sheva opened the doors that fed into the main lobby, and the three zombie extermination teams moved out.

**AN: And there' another chapter! This story is getting good! I've left a couple of loose ends out there for you guys. *cue dramatic manly narrator voice* who took the last radio? Why did Ada willingly give up hers? Whose side is Ada REALLY on? Why does Stevie get a bad feeling about Luis? Find out in the next… 2-3 chapters of Un-Conventional Survival Horror!**

**Now that that's done with, how am I doing? Is the plot moving fast enough for people? Do I need to write filler interactions? Do I need to describe more stuff? How did I do with the character development? REVIEW and tell me! MWAH 3**


	9. Chapter 9

**AN: Before I do anything else, I would like to thank my reviewers (haalyle, jedispartan217, Experimental Agent 1123) for their encouragement and support. This is the farthest on any of my fanfics that I've ever written before giving up and moving on! So thank you very much for sticking with my first published fan fiction.**

**This chapter is dedicated to the lovely haalyle! My very first reviewer! He/She and I have been talking to each other over , offering editing tips and encouraging each other to continue writing! Read some of his/her RE stuff! It's good!**

**Unless I finish chapter 11 and decide to post some more before Christmas, consider this your holiday gift!**

**Also, I have a new poll in my profile! I've been working quite a bit on some of the stories that I have planned, and I feel like I can keep up with two stories at once, although my update schedule for each story will probably vary, according to which story I work on. So, I invite my readers to go to my profile, and choose which one of my planned stories sounds the most interesting to you.**

**For now, enjoy the chapter!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Resident Evil or the characters. I make no money off of this fan fiction. Non-Canon characters own themselves, and I think zombies can be considered stock property, since every other game/TV show uses them.**

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Team Mattie~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Team Mattie split off from the other two parties early and made their way through the first floor and found the door that led to the mechanical rooms. It was very easy to determine which on led to their goal: Chris and Sheva broke down every door that had the words "Authorized employees only" written on them, while Rebecca and Mattie stood to the side. They had been doing this for a while before one of the doors yielded a metal staircase leading downwards into a darkened basement-like room. All of the team members peered down into the blackness from the doorway.

"This looks promising," Chris said, "But who turned out the lights?"

"Got any flares?" Mattie asked, looking up at Chris hopefully. Chris pulled out his flashlight and clicked it on. He shone the light to the bottom of the staircase, revealing a plethora of zombies waiting at the bottom.

Chris flinched in surprise at the sight of the zombies. Apparently he hadn't fully recovered from the Arklay mansion incident or the Rockfort Island outbreak "Okay, how do we get past them? Any ideas?" he asked.

Sheva peered down at the gathering of zombies. "If we had some grenades, we could toss one down and take out all of them at once," she suggested.

"True," Chris agreed, "But we don't have any grenades." This realization left the platoon to come up with another plan.

"Anyone got a plan B?" Rebecca asked after a few seconds of awkward silence.

Mattie racked her brain for ideas. "Hmm, In a History of War class, one of the strategies we learned about was luring a group into a narrow area and taking them one at a time." Mattie suggested, "The staircase is narrow enough for it to work."

"But that involves bringing the zombies up to us!" Rebecca objected nervously.

"Which is why Merchant gave me this powerhouse of a gun!" Mattie said, holding up her shotgun and taking a place in the doorway.

"Sheva and I can cover you if they start getting close." Chris added as the two BSAA agents resumed their places by the door.

"Right," Sheva agreed, checking the clip of her handgun. "Now how do we get them up here?"

"Zombies like live meat." Mattie told Sheva, pausing before looking back down at the bottom of the staircase. "Hello~." Mattie called. The zombies didn't respond and continued shambling pointlessly. "Anyone wanna go down there?"

"We are not using another person for human bait." Chris ordered, "Let's see how they like real noise." Chris took two heavy steps down the metal stairs, his boots making the noise echo in the lower room, and sure enough, the zombies were attracted to the noise and stumbled up the stairs in one thick line. "Here they come." Chris said as he turned around and darted back up, sliding his large frame around the door. "They're all yours, Mattie."

Mattie moved to stand in the middle of the doorframe, where she could see all the zombies clearly. Then a thought hit her, making her freeze in horror. "Hey guys," she said with trepidation as she stared down at the zombies, "I've never shot a real person before. I think I'm having second thoughts."

"They aren't people anymore. They're monsters." Chris explained, keeping one eye on the horde coming up the stairs, "They stopped being human a long time ago."

Mattie gulped. The zombies were getting closer. She looked to Sheva. "You can do this, Mattie." Sheva encouraged. Mattie took a deep breath and hesitantly raised the shotgun, mentally thanking Merchant for giving her and her friends' a quick lesson in operating their weapons, and fired.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Team Kate~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Shortly after leaving the ballroom, Team Kate and Team Stevie found their way to the hotel's emergency staircase and began their trek upwards. Kate counted the floors as she passed each number. "And three. This is our stop." Kate said as she stopped in front of the appropriately numbered door. She turned to Stevie as Jill, Barry, and Ada caught up. Leon, Claire and Luis were holding the rear guard and were a floor behind. "I guess this is 'Happy Trails' buddy," Kate said, "See you at the top."

"Hold on a second." Stevie said, "First off, a quick hug for my buddy." Stevie and Kate embraced each other for a second, while Ada watched them wordlessly. Stevie pulled away from Kate. "Second, Barry? Can I feel your beard? Or better yet, can I get a hug from you?"

Barry was slightly taken aback at Stevie's request, but allowed the girl to hug him anyways before the rest of her team caught up and passed them. "See you later!" Stevie called out as she made her way up the next flight of stairs, holding the hem of her dress up so she wouldn't trip over it.

Jill tried the doorknob. "Locked," she confirmed, "No problem." Jill kneeled down to the height of the knob and pulled her trusty tools from her back pocket. "This'll be as easy as making a sandwich."

"Sandwich?" Kate whispered under her breath, totally confused.

Barry saw Kate's confusion and nodded. "Jill isn't known as 'The Master of Unlocking' for nothing." The big man reassured. Ada rolled her eyes silently.

A minute later, the lock clicked. "We're in." Jill said. She replaced her tools and opened the door a crack, checking for zombies. "Clear." She declared, pushing the door the rest of the way open. The team filed into the hallway lined with numbered doors.

Kate glanced around at the number of rooms. "Think we could break into these rooms as well?" she asked as Jill started walking down the hall in front of them.

"Not without keycards. These are all electronic readers; they make my job harder." Jill replied before she turned to face her team, "We'll check out the rooms that don't require keycards. After that, we move upwards until we finish the fourteenth floor. Agreed?" All the team members nodded, even Ada who was keeping to herself more than usual. As the platoon walked, Kate decided to fall back and give the spy some company. Ada glanced over at her but didn't say anything.

At the end of the hall, a transmission came from the radios. "Agent Valentine, We're almost to the fifteenth floor. Everything looks okay so far. How are things on your end?" Leon's voice said as it crackled through the radio units. Jill clicked the button on her radio to respond.

"Everything is clear here Leon. My team just finished the third floor," Jill said, peering down the hall, "Hold on, we've got a straggler. We'll take care of it." Jill clicked the button off and motioned for the team to hug the nearest wall. A zombie that had been lying on the floor had decided to stand up and stand in the middle of the area where the hall cornered in front of them. "Kate, I need you to lend me your scope," Jill said. Kate pulled her rifle forward and removed the scope, handing it upward to Jill. The BSAA agent held the scope to her eye. "Damn. He's blocking the way to the stairs," Jill swore, "Can't go near him. That'll be suicide."

"How so?" Kate asked, squinting at the zombie through her thick glasses. She couldn't see why Jill was so worried about one zombie.

Jill handed Kate the sniper scope. "Take a look. You see how the skin is tinted red?" Jill explained. Kate nodded, examining the zombie's complexion through the lens. "He's been downed before, and now something in the virus is making him even tougher. If we go near him, he'll run right towards us, and we don't have many places to flee to."

Kate lowered the scope from her eye. "So what do we do?" Ada asked with her back leaning against the wall. Jill brainstormed options.

"Jill?" Barry whispered, grabbing the female BSAA agent's attention before pulling his magnum from his red vest.

Jill shook her head before she replied, "No. It'd be a waste of firepower, but only if we have no other choice." Jill turned to Kate as the quiet girl reattached her scope to her rifle. "Hey Kate, you feel like testing your rifle on him?" The BSAA agent suggested. Kate's eyebrows shot up.

"Me?" Kate said, pointing to herself, and then to the zombie. "At him?" Jill nodded. Kate exhaled deeply. "Alright." Kate turned around to face the direction of the crimson-colored zombie and raised the rifle to her shoulder, just like the Merchant had showed her. She focused one eye on the scope and trained the crosshairs on the target.

"Make it count," Barry encouraged. Kate aimed for the center of the zombie's head, right where the brain rested.

"That's not a human. It's already dead," Kate mentally repeated as her hands perspired while holding the rifle. "It's already dead," She thought as she hooked her finger around the trigger. "It has to be done." Kate squeezed the trigger. The recoil rocked her back on her heels a short ways, but the bullet hit its mark and the zombie's head exploded in a shower of gore, decorating the wall behind it in a sickly pattern.

Kate lowered her rifle and breathed a sigh of relief, closing her eyes and resting against the wall. The tension was over. Jill clapped her on the shoulder as she passed by, continuing onward. Barry followed Jill shortly after. Ada was the only one who stopped and offered consoling words. "You did good," The spy said. Kate opened her eyes to witness the kind expression on Ada's face. "Let's go," The operative said before she continued around the corner. Kate followed numbly.

Jill looked back and saw Kate lagging behind. "You all right?" the BSAA agent asked. Kate nodded tiredly.

"Yeah," Kate said softly, holding her free hand over one of her eyes while the other held on to her rifle, "Adrenaline crash and shock must be catching up to me."

Jill grew concerned. Maybe allowing the girls to follow along wasn't such a smart idea after all. "We'll take a break when we get to the next floor," She declared, "Come on." Jill opened the door to the second set of staircases, pressing onward.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Team Stevie ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After several minutes of climbing, Team Stevie finally reached the fifteenth floor, collapsing once they made it to the landing. "We're here," Leon said, sitting down and leaning against the wall, "Let's rest for a while."

Claire sat against the wall that was perpendicular to the door. "I am never EVER going to complain about wearing high heels anywhere that does not require climbing ever again," Claire sighed, catching her breath.

Stevie sat down next to Claire. "Ditto," The exhausted TMP-wielding girl replied. Leon pulled his radio off his belt and clicked the "Talk" button.

"Chris, Jill, what's the status on your teams?" he asked.

"We're currently resting," Jill's voice replied. Judging from the lack of an echo in the stairwell, her team was at the other side of the building. "We've just finished the third floor and moving up to the fourth. Kate took care of our straggler."

"How is she doing by the way?" Stevie asked, interested in what her friends were doing with their search crews.

"She's been real quiet since she shot that monster," Barry's voice crackled through the radio, "It's most likely just stress and shock though."

"Wow," Claire commented dryly before adding, "How's my brother's team holding up?"

Chris' voice came through the radio. "We're doing alright sis," Chris reported, "Had to crash a welcoming party though. Don't worry; all the guests have been taken care of. Or rather, your friend Mattie was extremely brave and shot 'em down as they came to us. We're about to enter the mechanical room."

"Go Mattie!" Stevie commented.

"That's all we have to report," Chris stated, "No casualties. "

"No injuries here either," Jill added.

"No casualties up here," Leon reported, "Everyone's in one piece."

"We'll see about that," Stevie thought tiredly, crashing from adrenaline herself and sorely tempted to fall asleep.

"Okay," Jill replied through the radio. "Continue onward. Tell us if you find anything."

"Roger," Leon said before he returned his radio to its proper place on his belt and looking to his teammates, "Let's go."

The group reluctantly stood up and stretched their muscles before passing though the door in front of them. Once they were in the hall, Leon gave his next orders. "Luis and I will watch the front and take point. You two watch the rear," He told Stevie and Claire, who both nodded in understanding. The two girls took their places behind the men, with Claire following close behind Leon while Stevie walked behind Luis.

As the team made their way up the hall, Stevie kept sneaking glances at Luis' Red9, which was holstered at his hip. Luis noticed this attention when he glanced back to check on the ladies.

Luis smirked coyly. "Like what you see chica?" he asked, putting his ridiculously attractive Spanish accent to work. Stevie looked up to him and nodded unashamedly. Luis laughed lightly, "Perhaps when you're older. Then I can take you somewhere nice."

Stevie gave Luis a confused look before realizing what he was thinking. "Oh!" she said awkwardly, "Erm, Thanks for the offer, but I was actually admiring your Red9. It's a very nice gun."

Now it was Luis' turn to laugh awkwardly as Claire muffled a burst of wild laughter and Leon looked at him with a raised eyebrow. "Of course. It is, in fact, a very nice gun," he said, trying to pull his dignity back together, "Saved me from certain death a couple of times now." Luis turned back to face forward and whispered under his breath, "Never again!"

"What was that?" Stevie asked, having heard the muttered sounds from the Spaniard after her had turned.

Luis turned his head around one more time to look back at her. "It's nothing you should be concerned about, chica."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Who knows where~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Sir. Your enemies are moving. Orders?"

"Gather information on their movements and sabotage them as you see fit. Reconnaissance is your fist priority. I want information."

"As you wish, sir."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Team Mattie~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After the one-sided firefight against the undead, Team Mattie was victorious as the final zombie was felled by a well-placed round from Chris' handgun. "That's all of them," Chris said as he checked the magazine of his gun and replaced the bullets he had spent, "Time to go down."

Mattie stepped aside as the big man started down the metal stairs, holding a flashlight in his free hand as he descended. Once he was down a ways, Sheva broke away from the edge of the door and followed close behind. Mattie followed her down the steps, joined by Rebecca shortly after. "Watch your step," Chris warned; the once clean stairs were now coated with a layer of zombie blood and entrails. Chris shoved the bodies of the downed zombies aside with his boots as he walked, but it didn't make the stairs any less slippery.

Once they made it to the bottom of the steps (with some slipping and sliding and holding-on-to-the-safety-railing-for-dear-life from Mattie on the way down), Sheva and Rebecca clicked their emergency flashlights on as well. From what the team could see, the mechanical floor of the hotel split off into several directions, weaving around various pieces of machinery that served innumerable functions.

"Look for a light switch!" Chris ordered as the team spread out. This time, Mattie decided to stay close to Sheva, while Rebecca remained a few paces away from Chris. As Sheva investigated one corner of the darkened room, Mattie glanced around, looking for something that resembled a light switch, spotting an area that was sectioned off by a chain link wall with a softly glowing light on the other side, guarded by a wooden door.

"Found something!" Mattie informed Sheva, "Let's check over there!" Sheva motioned for Chris and Rebecca to rejoin them, and the team slowly ventured towards the light. Members of Team Mattie stopped with their backs to the wall, making no noise. Chris checked the door, noticing that it was unlocked, gave a few signals and organized the formation: He and Sheva would watch the front, and Rebecca and Mattie would stand behind them, guarding their sides and the rear. The rest of the team nodded their heads in agreement, and Chris unlocked the door, allowing his team to enter. Chris and Sheva rushed in silently, followed by Mattie and Rebecca. Chris and Sheva suddenly stopped, causing Mattie to bump into Chris' muscular back. Rebecca stopped before she crossed the doorway, noticing that Team Mattie was not alone in the small room.

Mattie recognized the other figure in the room immediately. "You've got to be kidding," She whispered, holding her shotgun at the ready.

Ricardo Irving turned around, grabbing his handgun wildly when he saw his attackers, obviously expecting someone else. "WHOA! What are youse guys doin' here?" Irving shouted, pointing his handgun at Chris and Sheva.

"We should be asking you the same question," Chris said calmly, pointing his handgun at Irving in case the businessman got any bright ideas.

"What are you doing here Irving?" Sheva demanded, "Did you cause this outbreak?"

Mattie felt the need to say something as well, but Sheva had taken the words right out of her mouth. "What she said!" Mattie added, peeking from Chris' open side (the one that wasn't being flanked by Sheva).

Irving broke into a sweat. "The zombies? Oh, ah didn't start dat one," He said, "Dat's beyond my_standards._"

"That one?" Chris questioned, tightening his grip on his gun, "Tell us what's going on here!"

"Or somebody's going to take a blow to their 'standards'," Mattie threatened, imitating Irving's accent.

Irving chuckled, "Heh, Ah like yer impersonation, kiddo. But it's gonna take more than that to get info outta me!"

"Kiddo?" Mattie exclaimed angrily.

"Mattie, stay focused," Sheva warned, aiming her own handgun at Irving.

"Yeah girlie, stay focused," Irving mocked, purposefully hoping to rile Mattie enough to make his escape.

"GIRLIE?" Mattie objected violently, "Why I oughta-!"

"Mattie calm down!" Chris scolded as Irving laughed, sounding even more obnoxious than usual.

"There's nothin' youse can do anyway! Yer all goin' down!" Irving laughed maniacally before he bolted to a far doorway on the other side of the room. Chris and Sheva followed him with their eyes and started firing their guns at him, the echo sounding loudly in the basement. Irving, still wielding his handgun, fired back before he ran out of Chris and Sheva's sight. Irving's first shot missed, but the second one hit Mattie in the center of her torso, causing Mattie to stumble back and alarm Rebecca.

Rebecca fumbled at her belt and pulled out her radio. "We ran into someone! Mattie's been hit!" she reported.

The response was instantaneous. "What?" Kate's voice replied in surprise.

"Is she alright? How bad is it?" Stevie's voice demanded forcefully.

Mattie groaned in pain, but recovered her posture quickly and pulled her shirt up to check the damage. "I'm fine!" she reassured her friends, borrowing Rebecca's radio, "The bullet was stopped by the protective vest," Mattie returned the radio to Rebecca and turned to Chris and Sheva. "You guys go after Irving. I'll see if he left anything behind." Mattie staggered over to the desks Irving had been working at as Chris, Sheva, and Rebecca rushed away to catch up to Irving.

After running for some time, twisting and turning through the labyrinth of machines on that floor the search group was forced to stop and regroup; they had lost Irving's trail.

"We have to keep going!" Sheva argued, catching her breath, "He can't have gone too far." Immediately after Sheva spoke, the lights were shut off, plunging the group into darkness.

"Wonderful," Chris commented sarcastically. If Irving's purpose was to annoy the BSAA agent as much as possible, the shady businessman was doing a damn good job of it. Chris heard something skitter on the floor below his feet and turned on his flashlight for visibility. "We've got company."

Sheva and Rebecca turned their flashlights on as well, exposing several live, swarming, specimens of Las Plagas surrounding them. The parasites clicked their mandibles eagerly, anticipating the chance to infect new victims. Rebecca gulped in terror.

"Looks like he lead us into a set-up," Sheva noted, aiming her guns at the Plagas.

Chris readied his aim as well. "Let's hope Mattie can take care of herself for a little while longer." He said right before firing at the closest Plaga, triggering the rest of the specimens to attack and swarm the new predators.

**AN: I think I'll end it here. For the sake of suspense. Cause I'm evil. ;D Actually, I'm stopping because I think I can drag something out till the end of next chapter, also for the sake of suspense and cliffhangers.**

**I get the feeling most of my readers know what's going to be coming next. Hehehe.**

**We finally see some real villains! Irving's accent and character gave me quite a bit of grief in this chapter, not to mention I kept wanting to kick him in his smug face. Try listening his voice in your head while writing his accent, it gets obnoxious really fast. There is only one person whose accent I hate more than Irving's… but I won't spoil it.**

**Happy holidays! 3 Chapter 11 is probably going to be my favorite to write . . . even though I need to figure out how a certain scene is going to play out.  
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	10. Chapter 10

**AN: WHOOOO! MADE IT TO CHAPTER TEN! *blows party horn* Ye Gods this fic has taken up a lot of my time. I think I'm about halfway done with this fic, according to my outline. (I still have to flesh out some of the ending chapters to this sucker.) Now the good parts start! **

**As always, Disclaimer: I don't own Resident Evil or characters. Non-canon characters own themselves. Blah blah blah, don't sue me for this fic.**

**Oh yeah, This chapter has a special guest-zombie. One of my early reviewers had asked me to write him in as a guest-zombie way back in chapter 4, I think. It took a little manipulation of my outlines, but I managed to fit him in. So here ya go, dude! Hope this makes your day, and thank you for your patience.**

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Team Stevie~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Team Stevie had made their way to the 16th floor of the hotel without any hitches. Leon was tense the entire scouting period, while the other team members exchanged friendly banter amongst themselves.

Leon stopped the team in the middle of the hall, hearing a strange noise from farther ahead of them. "Sounds like there's something up ahead," Leon informed, "Luis and I will check it out. Keep checking this area while we're gone." Claire and Stevie nodded.

Once the two men had turned the corner, Stevie and Claire continued their banter. "Why do the boys get to have all the fun?" Claire complained as she tried another door, finding it to be locked.

"Because they want to be manly men." Stevie responded sarcastically, "Now if only they wore tights…" A mysterious, guttural, gurgling noise sounded from somewhere in the hall. Stevie froze. "Please tell me that was your stomach," the sarcastic cosplayer asked, hoping to everything that the source of the noise wasn't another monster, "Because I ate some of our food rations not too long ago; I shouldn't be hungry."

"That wasn't me." Claire said, sounding worried herself.

"Than what was-!" Stevie started, only to be interrupted by a loud groan. Both girls whirled around to see a zombie sneaking up on them with its arms outstretched.

The dead cosplayer was a dead ringer of Leon; Similar government-issue uniform (sans fuzzy jacket), same hairstyle. The only glaring difference was the zombie's height: The undead figure in front of them didn't even pass Claire's height of five-foot-five-inches. (1)

Stevie doubled over in giggles before she could raise her TMP. "I'm sorry," she said as Claire stared at her with a questioning look, "But that... is kind of hysterical! Get it? It's a miniaturized-zombie-Leon!" Stevie cackled in laughter as she gasped for air.

"Both of you! Get down!" the real Leon ordered, coming around the corner with his handgun drawn.

Claire pulled her convulsing teammate downwards alongside her, right before Leon fired at his undead counterpart. The bullet whizzed through the air above the girls' heads, right before piercing the zombie's skull and destroying the decaying brain matter. The zombie fell towards the two females as it died, landing face down. Once it was safe to get up, Claire and Stevie returned to their feet.

"That makes three I owe you, Leon." (2) Claire stated, while Stevie looked down at the downed zombie and noticed the TMP hanging from his costume.

"Hey, he's got some stuff we can use." She said, kneeling down to check the authenticity of the weapon and noting the absence of colored zip-ties, "This TMP isn't peace-bonded. Think he got it from the Merchant? "

"Wherever he got it, it must have been after the outbreak started." Claire added, rolling the body with her foot once she made sure it was truly dead, "Poor kid. He doesn't look much older than thirteen."

"Wonder what he was doing up here?" Stevie said, looking at the yellow badge that indicated the boy's status as a minor. The name "Experimental Agent 1123" was printed on the front of the badge, with his legal full name below.

"Could have been looking for his own friends." Claire said, as she kneeled at the boy's opposite side and closed his milky eyes.

"Yeah, well… There's no time to go looking for them now." Stevie said, coaxing the TMP out of the kid's dead hands. "Sorry dude, but this isn't going to help you anymore." After claiming the second TMP, Stevie checked the pockets of the kid's costume for other useful things. "Here we go~" she said, pulling out a wallet and examining the contents, finding $500 inside, "Damn, this kid is loaded!" Stevie whispered in amazement, pocketing the money away, "I love it when kids save up their allowances for awesome stuff!" Once the body had been looted, Stevie and Claire stood up, hearing Luis' footsteps return.

"Is everyone okay?" Luis asked, coming around the corner.

"We're all fine Luis." Claire replied, "Just had a bit of a scare, that's all."

"As long as you're-" Luis started before he suddenly stiffened in shock; everyone froze. Seconds later, the Spaniard slumped to the ground with a combat knife in his lower back, revealing none other than the black-clad 'Mr. Death'.

"LUIS!" Stevie shouted, this time purposefully mispronouncing the Spaniard's name as well as inadvertently catching the attention of the murderer behind the red-tinted eyeholes of the gas mask he wore.

"Take cover!" Leon shouted, raising his gun and firing at the mercenary. This bought Claire some time to pull Stevie away to safety. The mercenary took cover behind an abandoned maintenance cart before firing his own weapon, causing Leon to take cover besides the women as well. The government agent checked the hall. The mercenary was rolling the cart up the hall towards them, using his cover as a shield. "Now what?" Leon said to himself.

With her back to the wall, Stevie took the flash grenade that she intended to use on a Plaga, pulled the pin out with her teeth, and leaned past Leon, tossing the grenade with enough force for it to land behind the maintenance cart. The grenade exploded in a white flash as it hit the ground, blinding the mercenary. "Go!" Stevie encouraged as Leon and Claire rushed past her to charge their attacker. As the two Raccoon City survivors ran up the hall with their guns out, HUNK stood up and fired, forcing Claire and Leon to dive behind their side of the maintenance cart for cover.

Stevie peeked around the wall and witnessed something odd: Instead of taking the advantage he had over them, HUNK turned around and dashed down the hallway away from them. "Leon! He's making a run for it!" she shouted, pointing down the hall as Leon recovered from his last-second barrel roll. Leon turned around and sprinted up the hall with his handgun at his side, but HUNK was quicker and dashed around the corner. Leon sprinted to the corner not that much farther behind him, stopped and looked around.

"Damn it!" Leon cursed, hitting the wall with a curled fist and turning back to the girls after checking the hallway, "He escaped."

"Who was that?" Claire questioned, holstering her handgun as she walked up to Leon.

"Dunno. But he got a good look at our faces." Leon stated as he caught his breath, "But why didn't he kill us?"

"Cause that's not his job," Stevie said, walking up to the two survivors, "If he wanted us all dead, It would take one grenade to take us down. He must have wanted something else."

"Most likely: information." Leon guessed.

"Think he could he be working for someone?" Claire asked. Stevie nodded as Leon pulled out his radio and clicked the 'Talk' button.

"Chris! Jill! Do you copy?" Leon reported into his radio, "We've been ambushed!"

Stevie grabbed the radio from Leon in a sudden movement. "Everybody who's listening: Hide your kids, hide your wife, and hide the survivors too! HUNK in running around in the building! I strongly suggest you keep your backs to the wall if you don't want to get murdered!" Stevie shouted into the radio, "He's probably coming for you guys as well!"

"What?" Kate's panicky voice asked, crackling through the receiver, "HUNK's here too?"

"Yes, Mr. Death himself. Also, we've lost Luis." Stevie reported, trying not to crack up at the last sentence, "HUNK...stabbed him...in the back. Just like in 4."

"Oh no…" Kate said softly, growing quiet and somber.

"Where's Team Mattie? Have you heard anything else from them?" Stevie asked.

"No. I've been trying to check in with them. We're only getting static." Jill responded, "They must be too far underground for us to reach them. We have no choice but to move along."

Stevie nodded soberly and returned the radio to Leon. "She's right." The agent said, "We have to keep searching."

"Fine," Stevie said, "But there's something to do first." Stevie stood up and walked over to Luis' body. She knelt by the Spaniard's side, unfastening his belt and holster, which still held the Red9 inside, and attaching it to her dress so the belt rested on her hips. "I feel bad about taking his stuff, but there's no reason Luis is going to need it anymore," She thought solemnly as she returned to her feet, looking down at Luis' corpse, "Thank you Luis."

The Ada look-alike dismissed the reverie when she felt one of Leon's hands gently nudge her shoulder. "Hey. Time to go." The agent said, prompting Stevie to finish her thoughts and stand up. The girl whispered a short "Goodbye" to the Spaniard as the remains of the team ventured forth.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Team Kate~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After news of Luis' death, Team Kate made their way to the fifth floor of the hotel, once again surrounded by numbered doors on both sides as they walked. Feeling confident in each other's skills despite the threat of an ambush, the team decided to break formation, allowing Kate to walk in front of the group.

They had been walking for a while with no zombie interference until they reached a section of floor that split into a four-way intersection; The path in front of them led further down the hall. The left path gave way to a bank of unusable elevators, while the opposite path ended at a window. Kate stopped after a few steps, detecting a scent that would be considered out-of-place in an expensive hotel. "Hold on," she asked, sniffing the air before glancing at the dampened floor as she stood in the intersection. "Is it just me, or does this carpet smell like gasoline?"

Ada saw the overhead light fixture coming undone. "Kate, move! Now!" the spy alerted, dashing forward and shoving the girl out of the way as the light fixture fell down. The lamp broke, causing the electricity to set the soaked carpeting on fire. The end result was a wall of flame that split the team up.

"Kate! Are you okay?" Jill shouted into her radio from the other side.

Kate pulled herself out of the position she had landed in and sat up slowly, taking notice that Ada was gone and reminding herself to thank the spy later for saving her skin. "I'm alright!" she replied into her radio, slightly scared, "What do we do now?"

"There's no way we can get past this fire!" Barry shouted through his radio over the crackling sound of the flames. "Meet us on the next floor!"

"Be careful, alright?" Jill advised.

"Okay," Kate said nervously into her radio, catching glimpses of Jill and Barry through the flames, standing up and slinging her rifle over her shoulder so the butt of the gun showed behind her shoulder, "I'll meet you there." She waited until her teammates had left before turning around and venturing down the hall behind her.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Team Mattie~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Mattie searched the drawers of the desk first. If Irving had something to hide, he would have put it in there first. The drawers turned up nothing, so Mattie began browsing through the items on top in the desks.

"Okay, file, file, more files," she muttered, picking through items and setting aside the ones she felt were most important, "Sheesh, that gunshot is going to leave a monster of a bruise later," Eventually, all that was left was an unknown object that was covered by a large, stained piece of cloth. "Wonder what this is?" Mattie thought curiously as she took the cloth off, revealing two large cylindrical containers reading "Uroboros" down each side, with a digital clock haphazardly duct-taped to the top of the containers.

The clock appeared to be counting downwards, reading 6:45 before changing to 6:44. "If this is what I think it is," Mattie thought, wide-eyed, "We're in trouble." The Jill cosplayer fumbled for her radio, pushing the button that would play back a message that Mattie pre-recorded on her way to the mechanical rooms, just for occasions such as this one.

"Guys, we've got a seriously big problem down here! Meet up on the ground floor as soon as possible! This is not a joke!" the radio played back the message as Mattie began gathering up the files and other materials; she would tell the others about how Irving's Uroboros-bomb would go off in less than seven hours. The message repeated twice before the lights surrounding the worktable shut off, leaving Mattie in total darkness.

"What the-?" Mattie shouted in surprise as the radio continued broadcasting its message, "Who turned the lights off?" Seconds later, something hit the back of her head, causing her eyes to roll back in her skull. Round, red-tinted eyes reflected what little light was left in the work area as Mattie fell forward, unconscious.

**AN: Boom, excitement. I apologize for killing off Luis, but a plot twist had to be done. And besides, it wouldn't be realistic if everybody made it out alive.**

**Couple of notes:**

**(1)= This height is according to Claire's bio in Code: Veronica X.**

**(2)= This joke references RE2 and RE: Degeneration, where Leon saves Claire from a zombie with the same method.**

**I hope I did okay with the action-y parts of this chapter. Any advice on how to write action sequences better? I want to improve my writing for the huge fight sequence– Oops, did I just let out a spoiler? *crumples up paper and tosses it into garbage***

**Okay, Good night all! And Happy Birthday to JediSpartan217!**


	11. Chapter 11

**An: Yay! Chapter Eleven! I've got more exciting stuff for you this chapter! This is where the 'Suspense' tag really kicks in! Lots of long-ish scenes in this one!  
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**Mother of Pearl! This chapter is almost 7,000 words! This means I just broke my word count record! WHOO! I anticipate this story is over halfway done by now! I don't think this story will make it to twenty chapters, in my opinion. There's not much left to do before the big ending!**

** As I wrote this chapter, I made an effort to 'Show' what was going on, rather than straight out 'Telling' people what was happening. I hope it makes the story better for everyone to read; I'm still learning after all.**

** A special thank you to haalyle is in order! She helped me brainstorm a certain part of this fic! Thank you haalyle!**

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Who knows where~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Mr. Wesker," HUNK reported via his personal radio frequency, "I have information."

Wesker laced his gloved fingers together. "Proceed."

"Sir. Your enemies have split into three groups covering three areas of the hotel: the basement, the fifth floor, and the sixteenth floor. They appear to be looking for clues to the cause of the T-virus outbreak. I've already disposed of one of the lesser members of one of the search parties. Another search party has made contact with Irving and engaged him. Irving has no yet been apprehended," HUNK reported, "There's something else I think you'll be interested in as well. Some of your enemies have doppelgangers that are spread among the teams."

One of Wesker's eyebrows twitched upward in interest. "Describe the doppelgangers," He ordered.

"There are three female doppelgangers bearing resemblance to Jill Valentine, Claire Redfield, and Ada Wong. They are armed with weapons, but I don't believe they're professionally trained to use them and pose little threat. The doppelgangers don't look to be older than eighteen, sir." HUNK reported, "There are certain distinguishing features on each of them. Valentine's doppelganger wears glasses and possesses a different body type than the original. Redfield's doppelganger wears glasses as well and possesses a different hair color than her counterpart. Wong's doppelganger has a slightly different skin tone and blue eyes. I have already captured one of the doppelgangers and isolated another on the fifth floor of the hotel. Your orders?"

Wesker considered the new outcomes the three look-alikes presented to his plans. "Bring the doppelganger you've captured to our base of operations, then go after other two. I want the doppelgangers alive; they know valuable information," Wesker ordered, "Excella is currently in one of the conference rooms on the fifth floor; I will warn her about your isolated doppelganger. I'm sending Krauser to the seventeenth floor to block the other team's movements. I shall pass this Intel on to my men. You have your orders."

"It will be done sir," HUNK confirmed before ending his communication with Wesker. The secret agent tucked his walkie-talkie back onto his belt, picked up his quarry, and entered the elevator. HUNK pushed one of the buttons with his free hand, causing the metal doors to slide closed in front of him. The elevator began to move upward, shipping HUNK and his cargo directly to Wesker.

************************Team Kate***************************************

Kate walked down the elongated hallway nervously, holding on to her rifle tightly as she glanced back and forth at the ecru-colored walls and numbered doors. Despite her newly discovered skills with the weapon in her hands, the brunette cosplayer was very anxious.

The fire had had separated her from Barry and Jill didn't look like it would die on its own, so the team's only choice was to split up. Even though Kate was a natural lone wolf, she would be lying if she said she wasn't the least bit unnerved at the idea of becoming lost in the mass of corridors while trying to avoid another ambush by Mr. Death himself.

Nonetheless, Kate steeled her nerves and continued on her way to the other stairwell at the end of the winding corridor, her eyes darting from side to side out of what was best described as paranoia. "If only everyone else could see me," Kate whispered, trying to find humor in the situation, "I'm acting like such a scaredy-cat. Stevie would probably be jumping at me right now."

The girl continued talking to herself as she turned the corner, walking past a set of double doors that she knew lead to one of the convention's workshops. But now it didn't matter; the goal was to get out alive.

"I'm thirsty," Kate thought, feeling the dryness in her throat. All the stress she had experienced had made her forget to take a drink. And judging by the mild headaches and the sensation of the plush carpeting swaying underneath her feet, she was dehydrated too. Stopping for a drink sounded more and more like a good idea, as long as she was alert.

Thankfully, to the foresight of the convention hosts, a display table with several water pitchers had been strategically positioned outside the doors of the convention events for the convention attendees to drink from. "Convenient," Kate thought as she strode towards the table. She picked out a paper cup from the available stacks on the display and poured a glass of ice water. Setting the pitcher down, the Claire cosplayer checked her surroundings one more time before drinking.

"Everything is going as expected, Albert," a concealed Italian accent stated from behind the double doors. Kate ceased drinking immediately. She knew whom that voice belonged to. "Irving has done his part." The Claire cosplayer's eyes widened and she slowly lowered the cup she was drinking from, taking care to set down the paper vessel on the table as quietly as possible. Kate crept over to the doors, standing far enough to overhear the words of the speaker inside without being obvious. "The viruses are spreading," the person inside stated, the lazy Italian accent causing chills to snake up Kate's spine and confirm the eavesdropper's fears: The owner of the voice was none other than Excella Gionne.

Kate froze in position as shivers continued to sprint up and down her back. If there was one person from the Resident Evil games that she truly feared, it was Excella Gionne. Monsters and zombies didn't bother the Claire copy at all; she even considered in-game encounters with Wesker to be an invigorating challenge. But when it came to Excella, Kate was downright terrified of the Tricell executive. The Italian woman possessed her own style of intimidation and knew how to use it to her advantage. The slow, rolling accent probably had something to do with it too. Either way, Excella Gionne was frightening.

The Claire cosplayer was petrified in shock as she listened, as if her shoes had been cemented to the floor. After fifteen seconds of sheer dread, Kate's senses began to return, telling her to warn the others. The girl slung her weapon across her back and carefully grabbed for the radio unit she had stuck on her belt, holding it close to her as she clicked the 'Talk' button and turned the volume down.

"Guys? Are you there?" Kate whispered, praying for someone to answer, "Barry? Jill?"

"What is it?" Jill answered as her voice sounded through the radio, "Have you found something important?"

Kate raised the radio closer to her mouth as she spoke, "I found Excella. It sounds like she's talking to someone."

"Where are you?"

Kate glanced up both halls, checking her condition, "I'm still on the fifth floor, outside one of the convention workshops." Kate stopped to eavesdrop some more as Excella talked, covering the radio's speaker as she did so. "I think she's talking to Wesker. I heard her say the name 'Albert'."

"Albert?" Jill repeated, "Are you alone?" Kate replied with an affirmative answer, wondering why Jill would ask that question if the answer was glaringly obvious. "Whatever you do, do not engage her," Jill ordered, referring to her own past experiences with Excella, "She's stronger than she appears."

Kate nodded before responding, "Okay." She turned her ear towards the conference room doors again.

Excella's tone had softened, making it more difficult for Kate to hear the Gionne's conversation. "Oh? I'll be right up." the Italian promised, shuffling some papers. The sound of footsteps was heard, followed by the noise of a briefcase being closed.

Kate began to panic. "Shit, she's coming out!" the eavesdropping girl whispered into the radio.

"Hide!" Jill hissed before the communication was cut. Kate shoved the radio back in place as she searched for a place to hide. The passageways were barren, save for the numbered rooms, all of which were locked. Excella's steps grew closer; Kate was running out of time. The cosplayer's gaze finally found the refreshment table besides the doors. There was no other place to hide; it would have to do.

The manic cosplayer dove under the table as quietly as possible, crawling under far enough to be completely hidden by the floor-length tablecloth. Seconds later, Kate heard one of the double doors open, and the smell of Excella's perfume invaded the hall. The sniper followed the muffled footsteps with her ears, noting that the sound was moving away from her as the cosplayer remained on her elbows and knees under the table. The girl could hear Excella's conversation clearly.

"The documents? Yes, I have them." Excella verified, only to stop a second later, "Of course. I will check them."

Kate barely breathed as the Gionne's footsteps drew closer to the table, leaning her elbows into the carpet as she pinched her nose and shielded her mouth for extra measures. If the butt of the gun on her back collided with the table, the noise would alarm Excella immediately and she would be discovered. The girl flinched as the briefcase was set down on the display table above her. Excella opened the case and rifled through her papers. Out of curiosity, Kate removed the hand that was on her nose and used her pointer finger to gently lift the tablecloth two inches upward, revealing one of Excella's pointed, golden shoes on the other side of the tablecloth. Kate suppressed a shudder at the realization that her one of her worst nightmares was standing right above her, and the only object that shielded Kate from view was a long, goldenrod-colored tablecloth. The girl could hear her pulse pound with adrenaline as she slipped her finger back under the table, letting the fabric fall into place. After a minute's worth of eternity, the briefcase was closed again. "I have everything," Excella replied before she picked up her briefcase and began to walk back down the hall. "A few little girls will propose no problems," she added, only to stop again after a few steps.

The girl tensed in terror, holding her breath even tighter. "What now?" she thought desperately. Kate's thoughts roamed to the table above her. "Crap! I forgot about the cup!" she mentally screamed in panic. She had left the cup she had been drinking from on the top of the table! The water droplets that were left inside the paper vessel would still be cool; if Excella noticed it and figured out someone was eavesdropping, Kate would be absolutely screwed!

Kate banished those thoughts from her head and focused on staying calm, clenching her eyes shut in anticipation of being discovered. But the expectation never came. Instead, Excella Gionne turned on her heel a third time and continued on her original path.

Once Excella was far enough, Kate retrieved her radio and turned it back on. "It's safe," Kate whispered as she poked her head from under the tablecloth, "My heart's pounding like a friggin' jackhammer."

"Rendezvous with us on the sixth floor." Jill ordered through the radio.

Kate considered Jill's tactics as the girl's mind wandered back to Excella. "Actually," Kate replied, "I think I'm going to try to follow her for a while."

"What?" Jill objected in a whisper, "You almost just had a close call! What's your motive?"

"If I follow her, she'll lead us straight to Wesker." Kate reasoned, "We might not get another chance like this. I can double back and find out what she was working on later."

A tense silence came from the radio before Jill answered, "Fine. Don't let her see you."

"Don't worry. I can be sneaky when I need to," Kate reassured the BSAA agent as the lone cosplayer finished crawling out from under the table and stood upright, "I promise to be careful."

Kate repositioned the radio at her hip and glanced down the hall as the gears began to whirl in her head. What was the best method for stalking the Gionne? Either way, it was a wonder that Kate had enough nerves to spare after being scared out of her mind. That or the timid girl was a glutton for terror.

The girl breathed through her nose as she tread lightly on the soft carpet, taking care to watch Excella from behind the corners of the hall until the Tricell executive turned a corner. Then Kate would quickly creep up the hallway until she arrived at the next turn in the corridor, stopping to observe the Gionne's movements. This game of 'Stalk the Character' continued for a while, ending when Excella had made it to the elevators. Kate recognized the scorch marks on the carpet; this was the same area where she had been separated from Barry and Jill.

"Who put the fires out?" Kate wondered as she witnessed Excella calling the elevator, taking note of a manicured nail pushed the 'Up' button. "Guess the elevators work now," Kate observed from behind the corner, leaning into the corridor to get a better look, "So she's going up. That must mean— …uh-oh."

Kate hadn't thought about her reflection in the semi-mirrored surface of the elevator doors. A multi-colored, blurred image of herself could be seen in the doors! At this realization, she halted in terror, hoping that Excella wouldn't notice. Kate carefully leaned back to hug the wall, watching Excella closely as she did so. With any luck Kate could sneak away far enough to make a clean escape. Right before Kate's back could make contact with the paneling, Excella shifted her posture enough to reveal a small compact mirror in her available hand, revealing the girl's presence.

Kate flinched upon seeing her reflection in the circular piece of glass. "There you are," the Tricell executive said aloud to herself.

"What are you doing girl? RUN!" Kate's instincts screamed at the frozen cosplayer as Excella slowly turned to face her. After a second of hesitation, the terrified girl turned on her heel and sprinted down the hall she had just came up.

"C'MON! FLEE! FLEE LIKE A DELINQUENT!" the cosplayer urged herself, ignoring her muscles' complaints of discomfort. Kate didn't consider herself athletic by any means; her running ability was comparable to that of a cheetah: swift and speedy for a brief amount of time before she was rendered winded and unable to continue. "SHE SAW YOU! GET OUT OF HERE!"

"Where do I go!" Kate asked mentally as she attempted to control her air intake, legs pumping furiously.

"To the Stairs!" her instincts told her, "Hurry!"

As Kate turned the first corner, she caught a glimpse at the angered Gionne striding quickly up the hallway behind her, holding a small black gun in her free hand. "She's got a taser gun!" Kate realized as she referenced her sparse knowledge of weaponry with the tool she had seen. The threat of the taser handgun upped the ante of the chase. One hit from the taser and the poor girl would fall to the carpet and be left at the tyrannical woman's mercy, or lack thereof for that matter.

The Claire doppelganger stumbled as she rounded the next corner. "Okay the shoes are not helping at all!" Kate thought. Off they went! Kate chucked the backless, heeled mock boots off her feet into a corner of the hall, leaving her to run in the similarly colored nylons she had decided to wear under her shoes. They provided slightly better balance and less chance of injury, but detracted from the amount of traction between her and the carpet.

"Oh, no!" Kate thought as the end of the hall in front of her yielded a dead end, lined with several doors. She slid to a stop in the center of the passageway. A fearful glance behind her proved that she had gained some distance over the cutthroat executive, but Excella still intended to trap the Claire look-alike. Kate shook herself back into sane thinking. "Which one is the stairs?" she hissed mentally, looking between all of the doors nearest to her; there was a limited allowance of time.

Kate tried the first door to her right, sweating bullets as she jiggled the handle: nothing. She zigzagged to the door across the corridor: no such luck. Excella's footsteps grew closer. Kate tested the next pair of doors; both were locked. Kate glanced up the hall to check the distance of the Italian woman, only to have her eyes catch the "emergency exit" sign right above one of the doors she had skidded past a few seconds ago.

"Of course I would miss it the first time," Kate thought bitterly as she rushed to try the handle. The handle willingly turned downwards; the door was unlocked! Kate took a final glance up the hall before she swept through the door, pulling it shut behind her just as Excella rounded the corner.

Kate breathed a small sigh of relief in the gray concrete stairwell, but she wasn't out of the woods yet; Excella would have noticed where she was hiding and pursue her here as well.

Kate turned away from the door and sped up the staircase to her left. Excella wouldn't be able to see her if she was upstairs on the next floor. It would be too easy for the chaser to look downwards and spot their prey, or vice versa with the prey spotting the predator, which was why Kate didn't bother to look below her when she made it to the sixth floor landing, which was situated right above the door she had entered through. Only fools looked down.

The portal below her opened and the smell of expensive perfume filled the cold, vertical space. Once again, Kate pressed her back to the wall and held her breath. As long as Excella didn't decide to check the upper floors herself, the Claire doppelganger would be safe. Not to mention that the entry to the sixth floor of the hotel was within reach if she was compromised.

A few seconds later, Kate heard the door below her close completely and the scent of the horrendous perfume dissipated. The young girl collapsed to her knees in a sigh of assuagement; she was out of danger.

But she still needed to catch up to her team. Kate brought herself to her feet, noticing that she was still wearing the nylons. "This is kinda out of place," she thought, "But Mom's gonna kill me if I put a hole in this pair of nylons, especially since they aren't mine." Kate removed the thin nylon socks, leaving her bare feet on the cold concrete landing. "Better find Barry, Jill, and Ada," she thought, as she tucked the socks in the back pocket of her pants.

Once that was done, Kate pushed the door to the sixth floor open with her back, bringing her rifle forward in anticipation of zombies. After a quick verification of the area revealed the hallway to be clear, Kate stepped forward and into the corridor, allowing the portal to close behind her.

The noise of the door brought two sets of footsteps running towards the surrounding area. Kate lifted her rifle to her shoulder just in case, but lowered it when the figures revealed themselves.

"Barry! Jill! I'm so glad to see you!" Kate said with yet another huge sigh of relief, as she strained to catch her breath. Eventually, she was able to look up at the two ex-S.T.A.R.S. members, noticing that one of the group was missing, "Where's Ada?"

"She's not with you?" Barry asked incredulously, looking down at the winded clone.

"I thought she was with you!" Kate replied, out of breath.

"We'll figure that out later. What happened down there?" Jill demanded harshly as she stopped in front of Kate, desiring an answer.

"Excella….went to the elevators….they work…..pressed the…up button. Saw me….I ran like hell….barely got out of there with my head straight."

Jill inhaled tensely. "My god. You got lucky, kiddo, and that isn't saying much." Jill warned, "But now we have some information," Jill paused. "Now, about Ada: Does she have a radio we can make contact with?"

Kate thought back to the ballroom. "She gave hers to me. Said she wouldn't need it."

"Why would she give hers to you if you already had one?" Jill inquired, eyebrows furrowed.

"…Hold on…after I gave out the radios to each team member, I went to claim one for myself, but there weren't any left. I distinctly remember picking up sixteen radio units. Apparently one went missing between the time my team came back to the ballroom and the time shortly before the search teams split up."

"You think someone might have taken it?"

"…It's likely," Kate reasoned, "But everyone was talking to each other during and before the team arrangements, so it couldn't have been any of us."

Jill looked at the floor with a knowing expression. "Jill," Barry whispered, causing the BSAA agent's gaze to shift upwards and meet the older man's eyes. The two ex-police officers shared an understanding nod as their minds arrived at the same conclusion.

"We should continue on. We'll share this information with the others once we confirm the safety of this floor." Jill ordered, before turning around and striding down the hall with purpose in her steps. Barry and Kate followed behind her on either side.

"What happened to your shoes?" the tall man asked as he curiously examined Kate's bare feet.

Kate shrugged. "Long story. Tell you later." The Claire cosplayer answered listlessly as the team continued onward.

*************************Team Stevie*************************************

Team Stevie progressed to the seventh floor of the hotel, leaving Luis' body behind on the floor below. There was no time for grieving, according to Leon as he attempted to console to two women beside him.

Suddenly, something changed in the atmosphere. His 'secret agent senses' were telling him that something was off; Leon could feel it. Anticipation hung in the air like a stagnant mist. He had experienced the feeling over several missions, and every single time, Leon wished he were not as familiar with the heavy sensation in his gut.

"Stop. Something is not right here," he said to the girls. Claire and Stevie halted behind him, both of them going on alert and glancing around nervously. "I want you two to fall back and take cover around the corner. I have a feeling we aren't the only ones on this floor." Leon glanced back at Stevie and Claire, giving them instructions. "If it gets bad, I want you two to double back and get to the next floor. I'll catch up with you."

Stevie was about to ask what was going on, only to be hushed by Claire and guided in the opposite direction up the hall and away from the numbered doors.

As Stevie and Claire took cover, Leon extracted his knife from the sheath on his shoulder. Guns would be near useless in the narrow corridors; knives worked better in tight spaces. Leon's instincts were warning him that an old figure from his past was close as the agent carefully scanned the doors around him. Where was the enemy hiding?

"What's going on?" Stevie whispered, crouching to the floor once she and Claire had ducked around the corner, pressing their backs to the wall after verifying that the coast was clear.

Claire checked the magazine of her handgun, shoving it in once the Redfield knew how many bullets she had left. "From what I've been told, there's only one guy that sets Leon off like this," Claire whispered, "You probably know who it is better than I do."

"Hoo boy," Stevie whispered as her mind settled on the most possible outcome, "You know, if Leon is wrong about this, he's going to look like a total idiot."

"I whole-heartedly have to agree with you on that one," Claire added as she took her position behind the wall.

A random, high-pitched, female scream shrieked farther down the hall. Leon whirled around to find the source of the noise, barely noticing one of the numbered doors slam open behind him. Claire and Stevie saw the large figure rush out of the room before Leon did.

"Watch out!" Claire shouted to Leon. The agent turned around in just in time to see a large blade swoop towards him and executed a well-timed back handspring away from the attacker, buying Leon enough time to block with his own combat knife.

"Fancy seeing you here, comrade," Krauser growled, glaring down at Leon.

"I should have known you'd be here too, Krauser," Leon grunted in response as he pushed his knife against the larger man's blade, "What do you want?"

"I was told that there were some rats running around in this part of the hotel," Krauser replied menacingly, "I guess my boss was right."

"Who are you working for this time Krauser? Umbrella is long gone." Leon said as he countered another stab from Krauser.

"That's not any of your concern, is it?" Krauser taunted as he and Leon circled each other in the narrow space of the hall, "I know you have other teammates around here somewhere."

"Leave them out of this, Krauser," Leon warned. Krauser smirked, lashing out with his knife before flipping over Leon and landing behind the agent, blocking the search party's path.

"I can see the other bitch in the red dress over there," Krauser growled, looking past Leon and at the two women standing at the end of the hall. Stevie waved sheepishly before having an epiphany.

"Hey Claire, when do you think he's going to start losing clothes?" the Ada cosplayer asked, making sure the sentence was audible enough for Krauser to hear as well, "He loses them faster than Kennedy, and that's saying something."

Leon twitched. "They aren't the ones you should be worrying about," the government agent warned Krauser before swooping in with his blade.

The mercenary dodged to the side before back flipping out of the way, losing his hat in the process. The red beret fell to the floor, gently landing on the carpet as Krauser charged towards Leon. The government agent countered, knocking the brutish mercenary back several feet with a few well-timed kicks to the solar plexus before Krauser attacked with his blade again. Leon could only block so many times before Krauser reversed their positions in the hall, placing the thug between Leon and the girls.

Stevie watched the knives clash with rapt attention. "What are we doing? Leon could use some help out there," she whispered

"If Leon says he can handle him, he can," Claire reassured, "Let's move!"

"Not yet. I mean, Krauser's supposed to be dead, last time I checked. How many more times do you think he'll come back? I'm gonna help Leon," Stevie whispered to Claire before positioning herself in the middle of the hallway, facing the battle as she aimed her TMP. "Over here, Ugly!" Stevie shouted, catching Krauser's attention before squeezing the trigger of her TMP. Bullets zipped past and into Krauser's legs, narrowly missing Leon as the government agent dodged out of the way.

Claire scrambled over and pushed the end of Stevie's gun down, forcing the bullets into the floor. "What were you thinking? You could have hit Leon!" Claire hissed angrily as she pulled the cosplayer out of harm's way.

"I forgot about that part," Stevie apologized. She looked back into the battle, taking notice of Krauser's discarded hat on the ground. "Cover me. I need to grab something," Stevie said before ducking into the hall, keeping herself close to the floor as she quickly snuck up several feet behind the mercenary. Soon enough, the red beret sat unattended within her reach. With a quick swipe, Stevie glanced up at Krauser quickly before she claimed the abandoned hat, clutching the fabric in her fingers as she hurried back to Claire.

"Okay, now let's go!" Claire urged as she gestured Stevie towards the stairwell they had just entered from, "Leon will catch up with us once we're inside." The two women escaped into the stairwell, making their way to the next floor as they waited for Leon to reappear.

Stevie played with the beret she had swiped from the mercenary as she waited, spinning the hat on her finger. "Hehe, mine now, sucker," she taunted. Claire just looked at the girl like she was the newest patient in the local psycho ward.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Team Mattie~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

One creative retreat plan and several bullets later, Chris, Rebecca, and Sheva managed to escape the swarming plagas by shooting at stray canisters of liquid nitrogen, freezing the parasites before judiciously stomping on their tough exoskeletons, effectively killing them.

"I almost thought we weren't going of make it out of there," Rebecca sighed, walking with the rest of her team as she wiped Plaga fluids off of her face and onto her medic's vest, "Ugh, these stains are definitely going to need a whole bottle of bleach later. I'm not even going to start on my boots."

"We'll worry about appearances later," Chris decided, "We need to get back to Mattie. With luck she'll have found some clues on what Irving is up to." Sheva nodded in agreement, and so the team began retracing their steps back to the workstation where they had intruded upon Irving's research.

"We lost him. Have you found anything, Mattie?" Sheva asked as she approached the darkened work area, sweeping the small office with her flashlight, receiving no answer, "Mattie?"

"The lights are out here as well," Chris said, "She's probably gone to find a light switch or a fuse box. There are probably a few spare generators as well." The older Redfield broke off a short ways to look for the missing team member, calling for her as he looked for a power source.

While Chris and Sheva were searching for some way to brighten the area, Rebecca examined the files that were scattered on the tables. One stack sat neatly piled to the side, while others had been tossed haphazardly to the other side of the desk. "Most likely Mattie's work," Rebecca thought as she compared the contents of each pile of papers, saving the stack that Mattie had compiled for later analysis.

"Chris! Rebecca!" Sheva shouted, gaining their attention as she came back with something in her hand, "I can't find Mattie anywhere! And I found this on the ground." Chris walked over and examined the scuffed radio unit in Sheva's palm, noticing that the volume had been turned all the way down. The tall man took the radio from Sheva and turned the volume knob enough to hear a broken message.

"….big problem…here! Meet…. Ground floor …. not a joke!" the message played, despite being broken up by static.

"It's a distress signal," Rebecca said, "Mattie must have found something really important here."

Chris turned his flashlight onto the files in front of Rebecca. "But where is she? And what did she find?" The beam from the torch scanned the worktables until it fell on the time bomb, which now read 5:49. "Damn!"

Sheva's flashlight beam fell on the side of the canisters. "He's rigged it to release Uroboros into the hotel," the African woman realized, "We have to defuse it."

"Unless Sheva knows how to defuse bombs, we probably shouldn't touch it. I don't know much about bombs, but it might go off if we try to move it." Rebecca said, "I wish Jill was down here. She knows more about this stuff."

"We'll go back to the ground floor and call the other teams. I don't think the others can hear us from down here. We're probably well under the hotel." Chris said, "We can pass the message on to the others."

"What about Mattie?" Rebecca asked, eyebrows turning upward in concern.

"She's bound to be down here somewhere," Chris said, "We'll tell her we're going upstairs to call for help. She'll follow us up if she can hear us. "

Before going up the staircase, Chris hollered into the pitch darkness, informing their missing partner of the plans. The three survivors made their way back up the metal stairs and into the hotel. Upon reaching the top, Chris pulled out his radio. "This is Chris Redfield's team. We found something very important. All teams rendezvous on the ground floor as soon as possible." The male BSAA agent ordered as Rebecca arrived at the top of the stairs. Once the members of Team Mattie had regrouped, Chris led the way to the meeting place.

Within ten minutes, the remnants of Team Stevie and Team Kate found their way to the appointed meeting area outside the ballroom.

"What's going on?" Leon demanded, beating Jill to the punch as the female agent opened her mouth to ask the same question.

"First of all, there aren't just zombies here anymore. My team found several live Plagas in part of the basement. We're assuming they've infected some people in the hotel," Chris explained, "But more importantly, our old pal Irving left a bomb loaded with Uroboros in the basement as well. It's set to go off in less than six hours, so we don't have much time to waste."

Stevie and Kate's eyes widened in shock, not because of the Plaga infestation, but because of the newly discovered time bomb that sat under the hotel. "Damn," Jill swore under her breath; she had seen the full damage Uroboros was capable of.

"Does anyone else have anything peculiar to report?" Chris asked, looking among the survivors.

"We got ambushed twice," Stevie explained, "Once by HUNK, and the second time by Krauser. We think they've been acting under someone else's orders, but we don't know whom exactly. Luis is also down for the count; HUNK made sure of that."

"Whoever they are, they know we're here." Leon added.

Chris nodded in understanding. "I got from separated from my team and somehow managed to find Excella. I was able to follow her for a while and find out a few things as well. Also, we can't seem to find Ada. She must have disappeared after we were sabotaged," Kate reported.

Chris raised an eyebrow. "What did you find out?" he asked.

Kate bit her tongue before responding. "Apparently Wesker is here as well; he's been giving the orders. I overheard Excella saying that she'd join him," she said, watching Chris, Jill, Barry, Sheva, and Claire tense at the mention of the tyrant, "On another note, the elevators work. I saw Excella press the button to go 'up' when she called the elevator, which probably means—"

"He's hiding on one of the upper floors." Jill finished. "And another thing, one of the radios went missing while we were making plans. I think one of our enemies might have it, and if so, they know we've been communicating," she added, prompting paranoid turnarounds by many of the assembled Resident Evil characters, "We have to limit communication via radios from now on."

"That's wonderful," Stevie added sarcastically, thinking back to her warning about HUNK, "I wonder how much they heard." Her gaze drifted upwards until her eyes rested on a black security camera, noticing that a steady red dot was blinking on the machinery. "Or saw," she realized.

Kate glanced over at Stevie as Leon gave his report, following the Ada look-alike's train of thought to the camera. "Think he's watching?" The Claire cosplayer whispered.

"Possibly," Stevie whispered back, averting her gaze from the camera, "It would be logical to assume that Wesker would be hiding somewhere where he could watch everything behind the scenes without actually getting up off his ass to make them happen!"

"There must be a security room on one of the upper floors," Kate said in a hushed tone, "And I think we can bet money that he's probably on the top floor of the hotel. Wesker is nothing if not egotistical." Kate looked up from her short conversation with Stevie and glanced around the gathering of Resident Evil characters, noting the absence of another person. "Wait a minute. Where's Mattie?" the Claire look-alike asked, restraining a wave of anxiety.

Everybody looked to Chris and the rest of Team Mattie for an answer. "When Irving tried to flee, Sheva, Rebecca, and myself went after him. Mattie stayed behind to look for clues. She must have sent a distress signal when she found the Uroboros bomb. The lights went out and when we came back, she was nowhere to be seen. We've only managed to find her transceiver so far," Chris explained, "Aside from that, we haven't been able to locate Mattie herself."

Stevie and Kate both felt their chest muscles clench in anxiety upon hearing their lost friend's condition. Mattie was the most innocent out of the three of them; if something happened to her, Kate and Stevie would be unable to make peace with their consciences for the rest of their lives. Such was the burden of inseparable friendships.

The two girls looked between Chris and Jill for guidance with worried eyes and distressed expressions. The long-time partners had experienced the feeling of sanity-wracking disquietude many times before. The bond that existed between the three girls was evident as well. After exchanging pleading glances with the two budding survivors, Jill finally spoke.

"We need to find her," Jill said with a stony, decisive tone in her voice, remembering how Chris dedicated all his efforts to save her while she was under Wesker's control, "Partners don't leave each other behind. That rule does not change now."

**AN: Yay! Chapter 11 is done! I finished this on my last day of Winter break, so I've been back at school, which means my writing schedule has slowed down. Boo. **

**I listened to a bunch of Nox Arcana's music while writing the part with Excella. I say the creepy music helped quite a lot. By the way, The Uro-bomb is set to go off in 5 HOURS, not 5 MINUTES. Just in case people got confused.**

**Krauser's scene gave me some grief as well, but that crisis was averted with the help of haalyle and selected songs from Blue Man Group. I hope the battle scene with the knife fight was satisfying enough. If anyone has advice for action scenes, I would be very much appreciative.**

**And now, a random dance party while i finish chapter 12! **Resident Evil characters start to boogie to** _Gasolina_****  
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**The next chapter has humor and ANOTHER Guest-Zombie! :D See you later! Don't forget to review!**


	12. Chapter 12

**AN: Chapter 12! This is meant to be a bonus content chapter! Meaning it can be added to the story, but not absolutely necessary! Meaning you can skip it if you want (but I don't know why anyone would do that.)! In short, I've written filler. *****Dodges hypodermic needles full of T/G/ T-Veronica/ Uroboros virus***** Eep! I know some parts are unrealistic, but screw the rules, I'm the author! And this is a filler Chapter! I don't care!**

**By the way, sorry if this chapter comes late. I had a sharp decrease in motivation while I was writing it. Not depressed, mind you, more like a desire to not be productive. And some light, garden-variety depression as well, not the serious stuff. Somewhere along the line I did some work on a side project. I've also had midterms and all the final projects of the semester to deal with, so those have been eating up my time as well.**

** Anyway, there are going to be some more Resident Evil characters in this chapter. Hope people like which ones I've picked! **

**Also, I lied. There isn't another guest zombie. Instead, we have a Guest-Plaga! She's another one of my regulars that has left reviews almost every chapter! After this, I will no longer be accepting requests for guest appearances! I'm getting close to the ending of this fic and there isn't much more room to fit guest-zombies anymore. So there you go! …. Okay, I lied again, there's one more slot available. But that slot is in the epilogue so that person will have to wait a while.**

** This chapter is for my buddy RedSpyintheBase! She told me that she might actually write and post a fanfic soon! I'll stop talking now.**

**Blah blah Disclaimer blah: I don't own the characters of Resident Evil, just borrowing and manipulating them for my personal amusement. Don't own any other recognizable properties either. Non-canon characters own themselves.**

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ All teams ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Stevie cheered. "We're going to find Mattie!" she shouted out loud as she threw her hands in the air.

"So what's our plan?" Claire asked, folding her arms over her chest.

"Chris, Sheva, You didn't see a body, right?" Kate asked, looking to the pair in question. The two BSAA partners nodded. "So it's likely that she's still alive somewhere."

The burly agent shrugged his shoulders. "We think she's still alive, but we don't know where she is," Chris stated.

"We're running low on supplies. Some of us should go back down to the Vendor's hall and stock up on ammo, while others figure out what happened to Mattie and get this bomb defused." Jill proposed.

"Kate and I volunteer to get supplies," Stevie said, raising her hand in the air, "We'd like to have as many people looking for Mattie as possible. It'll be a quick trip, we promise."

Jill turned to the two girls. "Are you sure?" she asked, "Our enemies are still running around here."

"We've survived this much," Stevie reasoned, "I'm pretty sure we can take sure of ourselves for half an hour. Besides, HUNK doesn't know where we're going." Stevie pulled the second TMP she had picked off the zombie-child on the 16th floor. "And I can double wield now!" She turned to the blank wall behind her, tightened her grip on the guns and fired both weapons at once. Bullets pounded into the plaster, and the TMPs were jolted skyward by the recoil, taking Stevie's arms with them. The overzealous Ada cosplayer struggled to keep her balance, releasing her fingers from the triggers just as she fell backwards, landing on her butt with an undignified grunt.

Stevie moaned in a disgruntled fashion, sitting up to nurse her wounds as Leon stepped over. "Maybe it's a better idea if I take the extra one for now; don't want anyone hurting themselves," The agent advised as he kneeled down in front of Stevie and gently removed the second TMP from her grasp. A soft blush accompanied the awkward expression on the girl's face as Leon stood up and returned to his usual spot, carrying the TMP with him.

Stevie turned to face Claire, still sitting on the ground. "How do you do it? You make dual-wielding look so easy…" Stevie asked, sheepishly still feeling slightly pathetic over what had just happened.

Claire shrugged and gave a small smile. "It takes practice and arm strength. Mostly lots of practice." The older girl said as she helped Stevie off the ground.

Jill considered Stevie's argument prior to the dual-wielding fiasco. "Alright, but be safe, and be quick about it," the BSAA agent compromised, "We don't want to invite any more trouble than we already have."

Stevie cheered, "You heard her Kate. Let's go get supplies!" The excited cosplayer took her friend by the arm and forcefully pulled her down the hall. Kate played along, flopping her arms like a jointless doll as she allowed Stevie to drag her away.

Jill gazed after the two girls as they disappeared down the hall before turning back to her own teammates. "Let's go. We've got a missing person to find," The female BSAA agent declared as she led her compatriots into the shadows of the basement below.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Kate & Stevie~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once they were out of the Resident Evil cast's sight, Stevie had released Kate from her grasp and was now traversing the hall at a modest, much more reasonable pace. Thanks to Chris taking down all of the zombies in this area, the girls didn't have to worry about undead corpses sneaking up on them. However, both of the teenagers stopped upon hearing short, scuffling noises from the far end of the lobby.

"What do you think that is?" Stevie asked as she scanned the room for the origin of the sound, "I can't see anything. Could you take a look through your scope?"

Kate removed the attachment from her rifle and held it to her good eye. Everything appeared to be quiet. After some examination, past the information table and a few promotional displays, she was able to pinpoint movement at the far side of the room. It wasn't another monster.

"I think that's a survivor," she said softly as she continued to observe, "They're kind of small."

"Must be another kid. I got this, " Stevie said before lightly jogging towards the source of the noise and raising her voice level, "Hey small child!"

"What are you-?" Kate argued in a whispered tone, restraining the impulse to smack some survival skills into her buddy as she chased after Stevie. The concept of stealth was often either misinterpreted or lost on a desert island when it came to the spastic cosplayer, so Kate reluctantly followed after her friend.

Upon catching a full, look at her target up close, Stevie halted to a stop in her high heels, maintaining her balance with crane-like grace, whereas Kate, when she caught up, stumbled forward and threatened to fall over before reclaiming her own stability beside Stevie. Both girls stared downwards at their quarry in awe.

"Whoa," Stevie blurted loudly, eyes wide in amazement.

"Er," Kate mumbled awkwardly, "…Hello."

Right as Kate finished, Stevie proceeded to burst out laughing maniacally, leaving Kate to stare between her best friend and the newcomer. "Well…" the soft-spoken cosplayer trailed, "This is awkward."

"Awkward" summed up the situation perfectly. If coming across another Resident Evil character wasn't weird enough, the aforementioned character was one of the villains, specifically, the well-dressed Spanish shrimp himself.

"What are you laughing at?" Ramon Salazar demanded, shaking his small fists in the first stages of a tantrum, "How dare you laugh and gawk at me!"

At this point Stevie was doubled over in laughter. "He's even tinier up close!" she exclaimed, commenting on the fact that the midget in front of her barely passed five feet. All the while, Kate remained quiet, unsure how to react to the scene playing out beside her except to stare between Salazar and her hyperactive friend. This particular incident would have been humorous to Kate if they weren't actively attempting to rescue Mattie and escape afterwards.

While Kate was zoned out, she hadn't noticed Salazar redirect his fury towards her instead. "Why aren't you talking?" Salazar commanded, pointing angrily at the timid girl. Kate jumped back, startled at the reedy sound of Salazar's voice. "Are you honestly too dumb to say anything at all?"

The Ada double's laughter ceased immediately. "Hey, watch it short stuff. That's my friend you're talking about," Stevie warned, stepping in to defend her insecure team member. The two girls shared glances, knowing the other would do the same in reversed positions. Salazar backed off a little, intimidated by Stevie's strong voice. The Ada look-alike took this opportunity to change the subject. "Anyway, we've been sent out to look for survivors. A safe place has been secured in the hotel. We're trying to rescue as many people as possible; we don't want to harm you. Now, why don't we find your parents?" she asked Salazar, lying through her teeth as she did so.

Salazar grew indignant at being treated like a child, but begrudgingly played along. Nevertheless, the castellan was used to getting his own way and being in charge; perhaps he could use these two Americans to his advantage while he was trapped here.

The midget grunted his reluctant agreement, pouting like an angry child. "You see, that wasn't so hard," Stevie said as Salazar glared up at her, "I have to warn you though, we will need to make a detour before we can get you to the safe area. Our group is running low on supplies, and we've been assigned to get some from below. We can't exactly come back empty-handed." Salazar raised an eyebrow in suspicion but agreed to follow the two girls nonetheless.

Stevie was working overtime to hold back her fangirl squeals. "Don't lose it," Kate warned, scanning the corridor ahead of her.

"You try not losing it," Stevie hissed back, repressing the urge to squeak in pure joy, only to turn to a very confused looking Salazar five seconds later. "Do you want me to hold your hand?" the over stimulated Ada cosplayer chirped, reaching the hand that wasn't holding her TMP behind her. Salazar looked scandalized and swatted the appendage away from him, and even Kate had to withhold her laughter at the childish behavior.

The two girls lead the way down to the Vendor's hall. After checking to make sure that Salazar wasn't listening too closely, Stevie leaned in to whisper into Kate's ear. "Hey, Do you see any of his bodyguards? We found Salazar by himself, so they could be somewhere around here as well. Can you see them?" Stevie whispered.

Kate's eyes scanned the entire region to the front, looking to the left and right sides as well with her peripherals. "Nothing suspicious above us," she thought, listening intently for small sounds before twirling in a slow waltz-like spin to check the rear without looking too conspicuous. The quiet girl received an odd look from Salazar, but at this point Kate couldn't really care about what the midget thought at the moment; her brain was occupied elsewhere.

"I don't see anything," The Claire look-alike whispered in response as she finished her turn, "But we better be careful." Stevie nodded in understanding.

After a short trek down the winding halls with no trouble, the atmosphere grew a little more relaxed around the two girls, which allowed them to catch up with each other's adventures, specifically the changes in their attire.

"That's nice. I got Krausie's hat!" Stevie gushed after hearing an explanation of Kate's missing shoes, offering a cheesy thumbs-up for emphasis.

"Yeah, but weren't you scared?" Kate asked softly, a habit that had formed since Salazar was brought into the picture.

The Ada cosplayer thought for a moment. "Actually, now that I remember everything, I was pretty scared. If Leon hadn't been with us, something really bad might have happened to me and Claire. . . . Holy crudmuffins with butter…" she explained, letting he mind wander as alternative scenarios presented themselves in her head, "Any who, how was your little encounter with She-who-must-not-be-named?"

"Terrifying," Kate replied, "She's the flippin' Cruella de Vil of . . . of the fandom," Kate paused, remembering that Salazar was probably listening to them since he had nothing better to do, "'If she doesn't scare you, no evil thing will.' That's probably just me, though."

Stevie blinked. "…Why didn't you throw your shoes at her if she was chasing you?" she asked skeptically.

Kate paused, gathering her thoughts. "One: I never thought of that. Second: She had a taser gun. If I stopped running for a moment, I'd have been done for."

Stevie shrugged. "Sounds fair enough." After that comment, the group fell into silence as they approached the door that would lead them back into the garage, and in extension, the Vendor's hall.

Upon opening the aforementioned door, both of the girls noticed an immediate difference in the area. Stevie glanced around. "Hey, the zombies are gone," she noted.

"Yeah, and the lights are dimmed down too," Kate added, "That's strange."

"The hotel is probably running on emergency power right now. Chris said somebody shut the lights off, remember?" Stevie said, keeping one eye on Salazar as he caught up with her and her friend, "We're almost there. Let's go."

The small group proceeded down the wide, sloping stretch of concrete before them, keeping as far away from the shadows as possible; you never knew what could be hiding inside one until somebody got caught.

Kate lead the party down the winding path to the bottom of the slope, only to suddenly stop In her tracks and throw her free arm in front of Stevie and Salazar. "Hold up. I think I can see somebody at the bottom of the slope," the Claire cosplayer stated softly, "Right at the entrance to the Vendor's hall. I can only see a faint outline and moving shadows, but it's there."

Stevie squinted into the darkness. "I can't tell who it is, it's too dark," she said as Kate lifted her sniper rifle to her shoulder and peered through the scope.

After careful examination of the figure, Kate spoke, "It looks like Sheva. Same outfit and silhouette as the original."

"But is it our Sheva?" Stevie prodded.

Kate looked closer. ". . . I can't tell. They're too far away and their back is turned . . . . She's acting kind of odd."

"Define 'Odd'," Stevie inquired. If the person below them was another monster, it was better to know what they were dealing with.

"She's not acting like a zombie," Kate said, lowering her rifle, "So what do we do? She's blocking our entrance."

Both girls pondered for a moment before Stevie had an idea. "Get your rifle ready," she told Kate as she raised her fingers to her lips. Her rifle-wielding friend was sitting in position on the sloping floor and aimed her weapon just as Stevie whistled into the passage below. The taunt worked; The Sheva look-alike turned around and began walked up to the gathering above.

"Well that works," Kate thought as she focused the crosshairs on her target, "Just step into the light…" The Sheva clone walked into one of the bright patches cast by the floodlights above, revealing a convention badge pinned to the purple top of the copy's costume, along with angry, unnatural red eyes and a Plaga emerging from her mouth. "Uh oh." Kate thought as the Sheva clone came closer with increasing speed.

"Kate, I don't want to rush you…" Stevie trailed, raising her own TMP as Salazar rushed to cower behind her legs.

The sniper re-aimed for the Sheva copy's knees and fired. The infected cosplayer fell to a kneel, slowing her down enough for Kate to quickly adjust her aim and complete a headshot, despite the sniper's slightly shaky hands. The Sheva copy tumbled face first onto the ground and ceased to move. "Got her," Kate informed the others.

Stevie watched the corpse anxiously. "Please don't turn into a Plaga-head, please don't be a plaga-head…" the Ada look-alike thought, crossing her fingers for luck. After a few seconds, Stevie breathed a sigh of relief as Kate stood up. The chance of a Plaga sprouting out of the dead cosplayer's head had passed.

Kate slung her rifle back behind her shoulder. "Let's go see what this one is carrying," she said, oddly calm after just shooting someone. Stevie nodded.

"Alright. I just hope that wasn't our Sheva," Stevie replied, attempting to pry Salazar off her legs.

"It wasn't," Kate said, "Just another cosplayer."

Stevie sighed in relief. "Didn't think I'd say this, but thank goodness," Stevie replied, "Chris would be unhappy if we accidentally killed Sheva."

"Yeah," Kate replied, looking at her friend before casting her gaze on the clingy midget, "I'll check the body while you finish detaching . . . him." Stevie nodded, giving her friend permission to move forward.

As usual, Kate nudged the body with her foot to make sure it was dead before kneeling at the corpse's side. "Two hundred dollars, not bad at all," Kate thought, counting the money she had pulled out of the Sheva cosplayer's wallet.

She glanced at the bullet wound in the cosplayer's head as she closed the corpse's eyes. The blank stare was giving her the willies. "Sorry about that Haalyle," Kate said under her breath, using the nickname printed on the badge instead of the person's real name.

"I got him off me," Stevie said as she passed the corpse with Salazar trailing behind her, "Let's go."

It took some searching, but Stevie and Kate eventually found the hole that Chris made in the cloth barrier that separated the garage from the rest of the convention. Kate stopped in front of the rip and peeked through. An ocean of corpses scattered on the concrete floor greeted her eyes. "There's a lot more bodies in there than last time we were here," she said, voice returning to normal volume, "Somebody besides our merchant friend must have been in here again."

"Can you see anyone?" Stevie asked, keeping one eye on Salazar. The tricky little castellan had probably set up some form of trap down here if anyone were to come down.

Kate peeked through the tear of the fabric again. "I don't see anyone walking around, and everything else appears to be dead," she reported, spotting pools of sickly yellow fluid on the ground, "Lots of Plaga juice leaking out of them, though."

Stevie shivered in disgust, anticipating her currently dormant germophobia to act up at any moment. "Yuck. What's our plan?" the Ada clone asked.

Kate gave the situation some thought. "If someone else is inside there, we don't know who it is," she said, "It's probably in our better interest if the kid stays behind here. We can't have him drawing attention to us." Salazar began to protest, shaking his fists in indignation as Stevie clapped a hand over the small man's mouth.

"Will you be quiet?" Stevie hissed as she struggled with the squirming castellan before replying, "Can't argue with you on that one."

Kate nodded. "It would also be a good idea for one of us to stay out here and watch him. I don't really trust him enough to leave him alone. It's a wonder that I'm trusting him at all right now," Kate added, making eye contact with the midget as a hint of disdain found its way into her usually calm voice. Salazar growled in response as he pulled Stevie's hand off his mouth.

"And here I thought you were just mute," Salazar mocked, "I'm beginning to wonder if all Americans are as cold-hearted as you are."

"I'll stay with the kid," Stevie volunteered, shutting the midget up with her hand again, glaring down at Salazar before looking back at Kate, "If Leon hadn't taken the other TMP, I'd give it to you, cause rifles aren't good at close range. But then again, you are the crack shot!"

Kate nodded in agreement. "Yup, and I have very good hearing as well."

Stevie nodded a little nervously. "Okay. . . uhh, how do I know if you're in trouble?" she asked.

Kate checked her phone. Despite the lack of service bars, the clock still worked. "It shouldn't take more than ten minutes for me to find Merchant, get the stuff, and get out. If I can't find him, I'll come back every ten minutes anyway, just to let you know I'm alive. If I run into trouble, I've still got my flash grenade. That'll be the signal to come in and help," she explained before turning towards the weighted curtain.

Kate sized up the challenge before her and sighed, "Okay. This goes against everything I learned in 'How to Survive a Horror Story', but we don't have much of a choice. Hope to see you soon." Deciding the coast was clear, Kate stepped through the curtain and into the Vendor's hall. She took a glance around for safety before moving any further.

"Hey!" Stevie whispered, grabbing Kate's attention before sticking a money-filled hand through the tear in the curtain, "Take all of this with ya. Buy me something shiny that goes 'Boom'," Stevie joked, handing over the cash she had collected off the other zombie to her friend.

Kate took the money and shoved it into the back pocket of her pants. "Thanks," she whispered before having a sudden thought and poking her head through the curtain, forming eye contact with Salazar.

"And by the way, I CAN talk, but I'd rather not waste words on the perpetually ignorant," the Claire look-alike replied with narrowed eyes and a tone sour enough to curdle milk before pulling her head back into the merchant's hall. She could hear Stevie's faint voice whisper, "Want some ice for that burn?" and Kate smiled. The Claire cosplayer wasn't usually cruel to people, but when the situation called for it, she could deliver a good insult and a pizza with all the toppings.

Feeling confident, she turned around, hefted her rifle in her hands, and began her search for the elusive merchant. "Hope he's in the usual spot," she thought as she stepped over the dead bodies. The lights were low in the Vendor's hall as well, which made it even harder for the Claire copy to see where she was going. Kate stepped around another body, only to have her bare foot land in a cold, gelatinous puddle. The rifle-wielding cosplayer bit back a noise of disgust and continued in the general direction of Artist's Alley. "I do not want to know what I just stepped in," she thought with finality as she continued, "Would it have killed any of these people to carry a flashlight I can use?"

A mysterious figure swooped through the nearest aisle of the Vendor's hall. The movement caught Kate's peripheral vision and made her stop. The girl caught a glimpse of red-tinted lenses before the figure disappeared into the shadows, watching, but not following after the shadowy outline. In horror films, anybody who decided to investigate something strange was ALWAYS the victim of horrid mutilation.

"No way I'm chasing after them, especially since I'm already breaking one horror movie survival rule by coming in alone," Kate decided, turning away from the shadows the figure disappeared into, "I'll just go about my business, get my stuff, and get out." Speaking of "stuff", the Claire clone remembered her resolution to claim whatever loot she wanted and began stockpiling merchandise on top of various booths to retrieve later.

Once she staked her claim on the items in the vendor's hall, Kate continued through the darkened chamber until she found the entrance to Artist's Alley. The Claire copy peered into the pitch-black aisle. "That's strange," she thought, "Shouldn't the merchant have his blue torches up?" The rifle-wielding cosplayer grew skittish; Where was the Merchant? "Maybe I miscounted the aisles," she thought, taking a few steps backward before turning around. "Merchant?" Kate whispered as she slowly crossed the next aisle, "Where are you?" She only got a few paces away when another set of footfalls echoed throughout the garage.

"What is that?" Kate thought in alarm, wide-eyed as she prepared to raise her rifle. "HUNK? Stevie? The shadow from earlier? Or something even worse?" she worried before her better judgment admonished her for being paranoid again, "Stay calm."

The Claire copy listened for the footfalls. They certainly didn't belong to Stevie; the footsteps were too heavy for the stranger to be her. It had to be male; no female treaded that heavily, especially not with a such dull sound either. Somebody was wearing their 'Old Man Shoes' today.

The wooden tap of a staff hitting concrete rang out. The sound was close. Kate briskly dove under another one of the tables, covering herself with the tablecloth like she did earlier. "What now?" she thought, somewhat jaded at the fact that she was forced to hide below a display for the second time that day, "This whole 'Dive under a Table' act better not turn into a habit."

Sarcasm aside, Kate unattached the scope from her rifle. If she was hiding from somebody, she might as well know if that person was an enemy. "I hope this is just me being paranoid," she thought as she slipped the scope between her and the world outside the tablecloth, peeking into the glass tube.

The viewer presented better part of the concrete floor outside the table, but allowed Kate to see a good distance away from her current position. The hem of a familiar purple robe and the bottom of a staff appeared within the scope's field of sight.

"Paranoia has been justified!" The Claire copy thought, holding back a gasp as Saddler disappeared from view, "Where is he going?" Kate followed his movements with her ears as he moved away from her. The girl sighed in relief and calmed down a little. But of all the places to be, she had to be in a dark garage full of stiffs with the notorious Osmund Saddler himself, with limited communication and seven minutes until she had to check in and report to her waiting compatriots.

Eventually, Saddler wandered away from her position. Feeling brave, Kate crawled out from under the display table on her hands and knees. It appeared to her that Saddler was just walking around without a clue, so she had to be careful not to be seen at all. A confrontation with Saddler was like asking for suicide.

The Claire cosplayer changed her tactics, listening for the sound of Saddler's footfalls as she snuck closer to the ground. The number of tables she could hide under was few and far between, so she would have to figure out a new hiding strategy. Instead of walking upright and increasing the risk of being seen, Kate stayed close to the ground, shifting her weight as quietly as possible as she crawled underneath and through the various cloth barriers between the vendor's stalls, checking for Saddler before she crossed between each aisle of the Vendor's hall. As she started to pass through the third curtain, the sound of heavy footsteps sounded near her head.

Kate peeked through the fabric barrier before her. Thankfully, the shuffling figure on the other side was the Merchant, messing with something on one of his many pilfered tables. "Pst! Merchant!" she hissed as she poked her head through the curtain.

The Merchant jumped out of his skin. "OY! Whatcha doin' down there, Strangah! Yah nearly gave me a heart attack! Folk don't go creepin' up on people like dat! What's wrong wit' you?" Merchant protested as Kate crawled the rest of the way into the hideout and stood up.

"Sorry!" Kate whispered, "I'm hiding!"

"From whom?" Merchant asked, still startled at the girl's sudden presence, "That crazy bloke out there wanderin' around eight ways from Sunday?"

"Yes," Kate hissed, emphasizing the severity of her predicament.

The Merchant gave an exasperated sigh. "If it's any consolation, that's what 'e usually does," the cloaked man said.

"It's not," Kate replied, pulling the money out of her back pocket. The Merchant's eyes gleamed excitedly.

"Whaddaya need, Strangah?" the cloaked man asked, eager to do some business.

The Claire cosplayer glanced around the room nervously. "Before he comes back around, I need boxes of ammo for a TMP, rifle, and handgun," Kate listed, counting off the items in her head as she removed the rifle strap from around her torso, "I could also use a few upgrades, a stronger scope, and some grenades as well. I don't care what kind of grenades."

The Merchant took the Semi-Automatic weapon from the girl. "Give me a few seconds," he said before turning to his workbench. A few adjustments later, the rifle was better than new when The Merchant returned the weapon to the Claire cosplayer.

Kate grabbed the rifle out of his hands, whispering a desperate "Thank you!" before gathering the rest of her purchases in a stray tote bag and leaving the money on one of the tables.

The Merchant raised an eyebrow. "Yer not gonna try to take 'im out are ya?" the hooded supplier questioned, "Where's yer backup? Ah thought you guys had experience?"

Kate sighed heavily, "Truthfully, it's complicated."

"Complicated my arse," The Merchant argued.

"We picked up another person on our way down. If he came in here, he'd attract a lot of unwanted attention, so my buddy is watching him outside the Vendor's hall." The Claire copy explained.

The Merchant narrowed his eyes as he considered the validity of the cosplayer's statement. "Hmm, alroight. Good luck Strangah. Ah look forward to doin' business again."

"Got it," Kate said, glancing at the time on her phone. She had a lot of time to make up. "That is, if I get out of here alive."

Kate exited into Artist's alley. Sure enough, the array of tables the Merchant had been using for his substitute storefront remained in their spots. The only difference was the lack of a blue torch. The Claire cosplayer buried her irritation with the weapons dealer and started back to the point where Stevie and Salazar waited. She was halfway up the hall when a rush of air brushed her arm, eliciting a sudden stop from the Claire copy. The rifle-bearer's eyes searched the darkened chamber, only to notice a the shadowed figure from before disappear in a rush of cloth.

At this point, the potent cocktail of paranoia and nerves was beginning to affect the girl's mental condition, so she decided that she'd skip the rest of Artist's Alley and cut through the cloth barriers again. Bag of ammo and grenades on one arm, Kate stepped through the fixed curtain into the next aisle. From there she would have a straight shot to the area outside the Vendor's hall. The Claire cosplayer began navigating the covering of corpses that were strewn every which way, sneaking up the aisle with her goal in sight.

The exit was not quite five meters away when Kate froze; judging from the sound of Saddler's dull footfalls, the cult leader was about to turn one of the far corners of the hall. There would be no time to get out safely without being seen. Kate glanced around the immediate area, searching for hiding spots before deciding that the best place to blend in would be among the infected corpses lying on the ground. It would be slightly traumatizing at the least, but there wasn't much choice.

Kate found a clear spot on the floor, and set the bag of ammunition down before laying her body face down on top of it, turning her head slightly to the side so she wouldn't accidentally inhale Plaga fluids. To finish the pose, Kate let her grasp on the sniper rifle loosen and fall to the floor. Perfect.

The "dead" cosplayer remained still, listening closely as Saddler approached with his Plaga-stick. Kate held her breath as the cult leader stopped three meters away from her. Daring to look up, the Claire copy found that Saddler had decided to position his happy self almost directly in the path from the improvised entrance of the Vendor's hall to where Kate was lying. "You can't be serious," the rifle-bearing cosplayer thought sarcastically with a hint of fear as Saddler gazed down at the dead bodies. By her estimation, Kate had about three minutes left until she was supposed to return to Stevie and Salazar, so she couldn't just sit and wait for Saddler to get a move on and leave her alone. There had to be something she could do in her situation.

The Claire copy's pulse hammered in her ears, breathing in the rotten smell of plaga juices as her thoughts turned to the flash grenade on her belt. "This probably qualifies as 'trouble'," she deliberated as Saddler turned his head away from her. Kate silently reached for the flash grenade at her waist. "Now the hard part is figuring out how to roll it away from myself before it explodes. I'm already blind enough as is." Kate considered her options carefully before deciding on one and pulling the pin. "Here goes!"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Outside Vendor's Hall ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Stevie leaned on the fixed curtains and tapped the toe of her black shoes, waiting for her friend to return. She checked the clock on her phone for the sixth time since Kate disappeared behind the curtain. There were still two minutes before Kate was scheduled to check in, which meant two more minutes of boredom. And boredom was deadly.

"So . . . what's your name, kid?" Stevie asked Salazar with a bored expression, holding up the lie she had created to convince Salazar to accompany her.

Salazar raised his fists in objection. "I am not a child! Mi llamo Ramon Salazar, the eighth castellan-!"

"Shush! I know who you are. I'll try to explain later. It's really complicated but I know who you are and why won't you shut up?" Stevie hissed as she leaned down to his level.

Salazar grew even angrier. "No! I will not 'Shut up'!" he argued.

Stevie growled before speaking again. "This is really not how I wanted to meet you and I am terribly sorry-!" Her sentence was cut off by a bright flash from the other side of the weighted curtain, followed by a short bang of a grenade. Stevie flinched wildly in surprise as she turned toward the source of the noise. "Wha-? Ah crap that's my cue! Stay put! And don't you dare run away from me!" Stevie said quickly before darting to the rip in the fixed curtain.

The Ada look-alike peered through the tear and began to analyze the situation, only to have her eyes meet the tall cult leader's back a few meters away from her current position. "Double crap, it's Saddler. I don't think he's noticed me yet. Where's Kate? I can't see her," Stevie thought, her eyes darting around her field of vision before landing on the back of Kate's vest. The Claire cosplayer glanced upwards nervously, meeting her friend's eyes.

"I fire, you run here," Stevie communicated to her prone companion, signing in various gestures as she did so. Kate returned a subtle thumbs-up from her position on the floor in understanding, signaling to Stevie to make her move.

"Hey, Old man!" Stevie shouted into the vendor's hall, making sure Saddler had shifted his attention to her before spraying his torso with rounds from her TMP. Thankfully, the merchant had upgraded the gun to wield a more firepower than its normal limit, so the weapon did an effective job of holding Saddler in place as Kate sprang up from the ground, holding her weapon and the bag of supplies to her chest.

"C'mon! Get in here!" Stevie shouted as she fired through the tear in the curtain. Kate sprinted across the floor, stepping on bodies as she dashed behind Saddler. As she reached the cloth barrier she handed the supplies as well as her rifle to Stevie during a brief lapse in gunfire as the Ada copy slammed a spare magazine into the TMP. Kate climbed through afterward whilst Stevie continued pinning Saddler in place with bullets.

The TMP clicked empty. The Ada cosplayer's eyes widened as Saddler recovered his posture. "I'm out of bullets and they're about get shot back at us! Get down!" Stevie warned before shoving Kate to the floor. Covering her bases, The Ada cosplayer pulled Salazar to his stomach as well. "You too, lil' buddy!" she shouted over Salazar's protests.

Mere seconds afterward, a swarm of metal pieces whizzed above the heads of the survivors and collided with the slanted concrete , only to roll downwards harmlessly past the girls. After what was believed to be the longest minute of the girls' lives, the hail of bullets ceased as the last of the projectiles spun downhill.

"You really know how to make friends, don't ya?" Stevie grumbled to Kate as she stood to her feet, only to receive a nervous whine in response below. "Let's get out of here! The man runs like a frickin' ninja!"

The Claire clone stood and reclaimed her effects, more than a little skittish herself. "Yeah. Let's get out of here before he pulls out the tentacles!" Kate whimpered in agreement as she slung the sniper rifle over her back and picked up the ammo bag.

Stevie collected her sanity as she pulled Kate with her as the two of them began to run up the sloping garage. "It's worse than tentacles, the man can go Matrix on us!" she emphasized, remembering some of the finer points of the last fight in Separate Ways before Leon took Saddler down for good .

Kate gave a small squeak before noticing something was off. "Where's Salazar?" she asked.

Stevie halted mid-step and glanced around her. "Damn it!" she cursed. The midget had disappeared, only to attempt hiding under a management desk. Stevie ran back, pulled him out, and proceeded to carry him under her arm. "Okay midget, you're coming with me! I'm saving at least one person on this trip! And shut up!" Stevie shouted over his complaints, to no success, and resorted to punching him in the back of his skull. After the third hit from her fist, the small castellan's body went limp in her grasp. Stevie paused with her hand raised. "Oh, crap I think I hit him too hard," She realized, "He's not moving. . . but thank God he's breathing." Stevie shifted the midget from under her arm and repositioned Salazar to hang off her back with his arms around her neck.

Kate stared at her friend's gesture of kindness. "Why aren't we leaving him here?" she asked nervously.

Stevie hefted the castellan higher on her back as she looked at her companion. "Kate. We have two major sources of Plaga power down here. Probably not a very good idea to keep them together. Why don't we keep them separate right now?" she responded.

Kate nodded, seeing the Ada doppelganger's logic. "Good point!" the Claire doppelganger agreed.

The two girls continued to sprint for the entryway back into the hotel. When the door was in sight, Kate remembered something important. "Stevie. There was someone else down there, besides Saddler and the Merchant," she said, more than slightly breathless.

"Was it HUNK?" Stevie asked as she slowed down; the Spanish shrimp was heavier than he looked. "Or someone else?"

Kate shook her head, her ponytail following the motion. "I don't think it was HUNK," she explained, "They had the same tinted eye lenses, but something was definitely different. They weren't wearing a uniform; HUNK's uniform doesn't flow freely; this person wore something more like a cloak."

"A cloak?" Stevie asked, "Did you get a good look at them?"

Another shake of the head. "No. I could only get a look from afar, and even then they disappeared into the shadows every time I saw them," Kate explained.

Stevie sighed in annoyance. "Looks like we have another enemy to keep track of," she said. After the Ada clone spoke, a huge gust of wind rushed up the tunnel, catching Kate off guard and tugging at the skirt of Stevie's dress. The Claire copy shivered as the wind passed, suddenly recalling the state of her clothes.

"I am covered . . in Plaga goo," Kate said in the calmest possible voice, trying not to freak out at her new appearance, "Oh geez. I am so getting a shower once we're out of this building."

"It's okay, buddy. Your costume should be perfectly washable," Stevie reassured, leaning away from her friend a little bit as traces of old germophobia reared its head.

"I hope so. I worked too hard on this vest for it to be ruined," The Claire copy nodded as she continued, only to feel a wet chunk of her ponytail slap against the back of her neck, " . . . It's in my hair too. That's just wonderful."

A booming echo of an object being knocked over sounded deeper inside the tunnel, causing both girls to turn. "Maybe we should go now," Stevie suggested. Tangoing with Saddler with an unconscious Salazar on her back just wasn't on her to-do list today.

"Right behind you," Kate agreed. Since she had the free hands, Kate held the door back into the hotel open for Stevie as her friend rushed in, following swiftly behind her with the bag of supplies once the way was clear. Another encounter with Saddler was not her cup tea either.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Resident Evil Cast Members ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The search team split up to scour the basement. Rebecca pointed Barry's group to the area where Chris and Sheva had been attacked by the Plaga swarm, whilst Jill took it upon herself to find the bomb. Claire decided to explore the deeper parts of the mechanical room with her brother, whereas Leon was assigned to guard the door in case Stevie and Kate were to return early. Each crew investigated every corner of the chamber, regrouping near the stairs hour later.

"There's no sign of a struggle," Sheva reported as she approached Chris upon his return, examining the spaces around the room, "Somebody must have snuck up on her. I don't think she would have tried to come after us."

"Especially after we told her we'd be right back down," Chris added as he swept his flashlight, searching for Mattie.

Jill briskly jogged out of the workroom Irving had set up. "She's nowhere in the workroom," the agent reported, "Rebecca's gathering up the files Mattie set aside for us. Also, the Uroboros bomb is not there."

"What?" Sheva exclaimed, looking at Jill incredulously, "Chris and Rebecca both saw it on that table. Bombs just don't get up and walk off."

Jill fidgeted with her fingerless gloves, pulling the material tighter. "Apparently either this one does, or someone else got to it before we did," Jill stated with a hint of sarcasm, "The bomb's not there."

Chris sighed in irritation, "If we don't find it, this building is going to be consumed by Uroboros with us inside. We only have a few hours before Uroboros is released."

"So what should we do?" Sheva asked, eagerly awaiting orders, "There's not much more we can do down here."

Jill sighed deeply, pinching the bridge of her nose. "I can't believe I'm saying this," she said, "but we have to forget about the bomb for now. Our priority should be finding Mattie and meeting up with the other girls when they return with supplies. We'll see if we can track down Mattie down here before we go back to the surface. Agreed?"

Chris and Sheva nodded. "Alright then," Jill said, dismissing her teammates to proceed with their search. She turned as her companions left, scanning the area with her own flashlight, searching for the lost survivor.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Kate & Stevie ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The two wild-eyed girls sprinted through the hotel, one carrying the bag of supplies, the other transporting an unconscious midget. Both cosplayers saw Leon at the same time as they rounded the last corner, adrenaline pumping furiously through their veins.

"Leon!" the two girls shouted at the same time as they charged towards him. The agent's head turned.

"What happened?" he interrogated as the two girls came to a stop in front of him, "Are you two alright?"

"Saddler…down there! Got out…. with supplies!" Kate gasped, panting for breath as she dropped the bag of ammo and grenades in front of the agent's feet.

"Sleeping midget…on my back!" Stevie added, still holding up Salazar. Leon extracted his handgun. The Ada copy held up one hand in front of her in a signal to stop him. "Hold up Leon, as far as both of us know, he's never interacted with the REAL enemy in this place. I don't think he'll have any information that can help us," Stevie reasoned. Besides, without his bodyguards, Salazar wasn't much of a threat in the first place.

"Exactly," Kate said.

Leon considered the Ada copy's words before returning his gun to its proper place. "The others should be coming back up soon," he stated as he turned and began walking back to the meeting place, a little more disgruntled than before because of Salazar's presence.

Kate sighed and leaned backwards to look at the unconscious Salazar riding on Stevie's back, "You know, I don't think he's gonna be vey agreeable when he wakes up. Maybe we should hide him from everyone else."

"Yeah, good thinking," The younger girl said, nodding towards one of the closets in the hall, "Let's shove him in here for now." Stevie opened the door of the nearest supply closet, recognizing the interior in an instant. "Hey, This is where we found Luis! How fitting!" The Ada look-alike commented as she deposited Salazar inside in a not-so-gentle fashion, "Sorry little dude, but you were always one of my favorite villains. Good night!" Stevie closed the closet door unceremoniously as Kate walked over and stuck a stray chair in front of the aforementioned closet, since there was no key to lock it with.

"Okay, that's taken care of. Time to catch up to Leon and the others." Kate said, making a show of dusting her hands off after she positioned the chair correctly. Stevie nodded, and the two girls walked away to catch up to Leon.

"You guys find anything?" Stevie asked as she approached the gathering, "We've got enough ammo and grenades to go around!"

Chris shook his head. "The Uroboros bomb is gone. Someone got to it before us," Chris explained, "We weren't able to find Mattie either." Stevie and Kate tensed up once again. "I'm sorry to say this, but it's most likely that she's been taken hostage by one of Wesker's henchmen." The faces of the two girls fell.

Kate summoned up the courage to speak. "But-! We have to find her!" the Claire copy pleaded anxiously.

"I'm sorry, but she could be anywhere in the hotel by now," Sheva reasoned with sorrowful look on her face, "We don't have time to search the entire building."

"We don't have to search the whole building!" Stevie argued, "If she's with Wesker, we just have to determine his hideout!"

"But how can we figure out where he's hiding?" Barry asked.

"If you have any idea where he's hiding, tell us now," Chris demanded in the calmest tone he could muster. The muscle-bound BSAA agent didn't want the young survivors to panic, but based on the strength of his conviction, he wanted some answers.

**AN: Aiyaaaah! This chapter took a long time to write! It took up 21 pages in Word! New word count record at over 8,000! Curse you schoolwork and midterms and depression and other stuff! Salazar gave me some much grief in this chapter cause I didn't know what exactly he would say at certain moments! Other parts were just awkward in the sense where "I know what happens next, but how do I communicate it effectively in the story without sounding boring?" Stuff like that. Hopefully the chapters leading up to the end will be easier. However, since I've altered my posting schedule, it will take a while for the next chapters to show up.**

**In the meanywhile, I think the next thing I post will be a new short story about one of my favorite villains. So look out for that, okay?  
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**Also, the book "How to Survive a Horror Movie" is a real book. That little book has serious rules to live by! I urge any budding survivalists to pick it up!  
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**I hope everyone enjoyed their dose of RE4 villains! I know RedSpyintheBase will! Anyway, you guys know the drill! Hit the Review button below, leave a message and I will give out virtual cookies with rainbow sprinkles! XD**


	13. Chapter 13

**AN: Back to regularly scheduled storyline! My playlist of video game music to write to is finally being put to good use! We're close to the ending now! Short-ish chapter this time, cause there's not a lot of dialogue going on, and there's a perfect spot for a cliffhanger. **

**JediSpartan217 made a cover for this story! I think she's also working on one for Wesker's Angels as well. If you're reading this, Jedispartan217, get a deviantart account (if you don't have one already) and post your art! If anyone else has any fan-art of this fic, go ahead! Post it and send me the links! **

**Reason why this chapter has taken so long: I've been playing my 3DS! Mostly with Revelations! :D RE: Revelations is amazing! It will scare you really good! But enough of my talking.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Resident Evil; Capcom does. Non-canon characters own themselves!**

Jill turned to the two girls. "Do either of you have any ideas on where they could be?" she asked.

"Let's see," Stevie started, speaking in a serious tone, "He's definitely on the upper floors. Kate saw Excella call the elevator to go upwards before she almost got caught." Kate flinched at the mention of the memory. "Now, if I was Wesker, where would I hide? Somewhere where I could give commands and watch everything that happens, which means our best bet is one of the surveillance rooms on the upper floors. Which also means that he's probably watching through the security cameras." Several Resident Evil characters flinched. "Don't turn around; there's one watching us right now."

"So he's on one of the floors above number five," Claire said, folding her arms over her chest, "That's not much to for us go on."

"Any chance we can narrow it down further?" Leon questioned, looking around the gathering of survivors.

Both girls sunk into thinking poses. "It's likely he's on the topmost floors. This is Wesker we are talking about," Kate said, unfazed by the situation, "There's a room on the 30th floor that was set up for karaoke. Lots of windows as well, and access to the roof. Plenty of space to set up a temporary headquarters."

"That bastard is nothing if not egotistical," Chris growled under his breath.

"We think there's a strong chance Mattie is up there with him as well," Kate added. Chris turned towards her.

"How do you know?" the male BSAA agent asked.

"At this point, Wesker probably knows that my friends and I are here. His henchmen got a good look at our faces, one of them could have easily reported us to him," Kate explained as the volume of her voice increased at a steady rate, "I mean, there's a couple of doppelgangers dressed like his enemies running around with members of the BSAA! Why wouldn't he be interested?"

Chris sunk into a thinking pose, considering the information. Everything the girls told him was completely speculative, but logical nonetheless. "Mattie must have been taken when we left to catch up to Irving," he said, "But by who? We know it couldn't have been Irving."

"Didn't you guys get my warning about HUNK?" Stevie asked, sounding a teeny bit aggravated at the current situation, "If there's one person that does the most of Wesker's dirty work, it's him!"

"Warning?" Sheva repeated, "We never received any warnings. The distance must have interfered with our radio signals."

Stevie slapped a hand to her face. "Figures," she muttered to herself before collecting her composure.

"So how do we get up there?" Barry asked.

"The elevators are operational, and they'll be quicker," Rebecca suggested.

Chris shook his head. "Not a good idea. If he's expecting us, then Wesker can set up a trap or have someone waiting for us at the top. We'd be sitting ducks. The stairs are our best option," Chris said, checking the clip on his pistol, "The stairs should us lead straight upward. If anyone ambushes us, there's a chance we can take them down. Agreed?" Stevie, Kate, and the present members of the Resident Evil cast nodded. "Good, let's go."

The two girls led the way, anxious to find their friend. As the search group began walking behind them, Stevie turned around and faced them as Kate ran ahead to find the correct door. "Don't forget! Shoot out any cameras you see!" the Ada clone instructed, "They'll hide our escape route later! Whoever shoots out the most cameras wins." The Resident Evil characters nodded in agreement.

Stevie and Kate entered the stairwell first, flanked by various Resident Evil characters on both sides and at the rear as they jogged up the stairs in a brisk fashion. "Hold on, Mattie! We're coming!" Kate shouted up the winding stairwell, even though her cries were unheard by their intended recipient.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Who knows? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Wesker sat in the surveillance room of the top floor, browsing the images behind his sunglasses. He watched each of the screens as one by one, the feedback turned into static. "Sharper than they look," Wesker commented, "But still very foolish. I know exactly where you are."

The sound of a distinct pair of high heels entered the room and stopped behind Wesker, alerting him to the new presence. "I trust you have something to report, Ms. Wong?" he assumed, not bothering to swivel his chair to face the newcomer.

Ada moved to stand near Wesker's side, folding her arms over her chest. "I've hidden Irving's Uroboros bomb as you requested," Ada stated coldly, "The BSAA and their allies will never be able to find it."

"Good," Wesker replied before staring up at the screens again. "What have you found out about those two?" Wesker asked, focusing on the black and white images of Stevie and Kate before the image burst into static.

Ada followed Wesker's gaze to the next screen of footage. "They'll definitely be useful, but both of them are very strong-minded, especially when they're together. They won't be converted to your will easily," She warned, pointing out the next screen to Wesker as the two girls rounded another corner and shot out the camera, "Those two are a pair to be reckoned with."

Wesker bent his head downward as he considered the Intel the spy had presented to him. "Perhaps with the right leverage, I can make them willing to cooperate," he countered, lifting his head to stare at the screens again, "You've done your part well, Ms. Wong, but it's not over yet."

Ada's eyes flashed. "You realize those two will be coming after you now that you've taken their friend," she warned.

Wesker smirked, a movement that did not go unnoticed by Ada. "Of course I do. That is exactly what I have been planning on."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~With Kate & Stevie~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The rescue party hurried up each staircase, hearts pounding, and stopping only to help Rebecca after she injured her ankle somewhere around the fourteenth floor. "It's just a light sprain," the medic reassured as she leaned against he cold concrete wall, "I'll be alright in a bit."

Jill gazed upwards at the distance they had yet to cover. "It feels like we haven't gotten anywhere," she breathed as she attempted to catch her breath from jogging several flights of stairs.

Claire gasped for air as she bent over, holding herself up with her hands on her knees. "I suppose there's no chance we could take a break?" she asked with a hint of sarcasm.

Sheva spun around to glare at the young Redfield. "There's no time to rest!" the African woman scolded, "We're running out of time! Let's not forget about the time bomb filled with Uroboros hiding somewhere in this place."

"Hey, I'm all for saving our teammate!" Claire argued, infamous Redfield temper flaring behind her blue eyes, "But it's not gonna be worth much if our team is badly injured before we get to her!"

"Injured?" Sheva countered angrily, "If that bomb goes off, we'll all be dead!"

Chris took notice of the growing row between his sister and the BSAA agent, quickly positioning himself between the two women. "Enough," he ordered, "If we keep arguing, we'll only waste precious time." The arguing women made eye contact with Chris. "Now, we'll make sure Rebecca is okay to move on before we do anything else. Going into combat without a medic is inviting trouble, especially since we're dealing with Wesker."

The two girls watched the exchange between Chris, Sheva, and Claire while Leon and Jill helped Rebecca stand upright. Barry was watching for a potential ambush. Both cosplayers felt tension build up in their stomachs as Chris talked. Stevie gave Kate a subtle nudge with her elbow, catching the older girl's notice before signaling upward with her eyes. The Claire cosplayer nodded in agreement, after which both girls turned away from the group and raced up the next set of stairs to the landing.

"Hey! Where are you going?" Barry shouted, being the first to notice their rapid exit. The rest of the Resident Evil cast turned their heads aloft to look.

"To save Mattie!" Stevie shouted back at the Resident Evil cast as she and Kate veered the crook of the path, running up the next staircase.

"Hey! Wait!" Leon started, but he was too late. The minds of the two girls were made up as they ran further.

"We'll catch up with them," Jill stated as she spent a canister of first-aid spray on Rebecca's ankle and tossed the can behind her, "Let's go."

Far above them, the two girls persisted in their sprint to the top of the building, powered by adrenaline and concern for Mattie's safety. Their breathing patterns were kept in check, synced to footfalls that slapped and echoed on the stone concrete. Despite rising fatigue and their lack of proper athletic shoes, both teens pushed onward to the thirtieth floor. At the top of the chamber, Stevie held the door open as her ally tore into the room.

The Claire copy's eyes scanned the wide area in a swift motion, seeing many black devices and files on top of tables, but no people. "They're not here!" she declared, eyes darting through the room as Stevie slowed beside her friend.

"Damn," Stevie cursed, glancing around the pieces of machinery as she panted for breath, "We were right about the hideout, but where is everybody?"

A loud, shrill drone like a giant drill disrupted the girls' trains of thought, triggering Kate to cover her ears and duck to the floor.

"What is that noise?" The red-vested cosplayer hollered as she cast her eyes to the ceiling, attempting to determine the source of the din.

The Ada copy's blue eyes widened as she recognized the source of the clamor. "It's a helicopter!" Stevie replied, shouting to be heard, "They're on the roof!" The two survivors made a mad dash back into the stairwell. They didn't bother to check the progress of their comrades down below, racing into the last set of stairs with frantic pulses.

The purr of the helicopter blades dissipated, urging the girls forward as they ran. The door at the top was cracked open, baring a strip of sunlight. Kate slammed into the door shoulder first as her body made impact, forcing the door the rest of the way ajar as the two girls rushed onto the roof.

The Claire cosplayer stopped first, swiveling her head as she looked around. Stevie slowed to a stop beside Kate, searching the skyline of the city for the elusive helicopter. The Claire cosplayer halted her motions as soon as she discovered their target and realized exactly whom she and her friend were up against.

"Stevie," Kate whispered, staring forward in shock at the scene before her. The Ada clone's head turned to the spot her comrade was so fixated on. The sight in front of her caused her temper to flare wildly.

"WESKER!" Stevie's loud yell echoed in the high altitude of the hotel, lifting to the air as a large gust of wind filled the battlefield that awaited just beyond.

**AN**: **Aaaand CLIFFHANGER! Here we are! The third-to-last chapter of UCSH! I hope everyone enjoyed it! As usual, review down below!**


	14. Chapter 14

**AN: WHOO! Second-to-last chapter! This is where the action happens, readers! This is going to be another long chapter, but it's the friggin' final battle! It's supposed to be long! Thanks to JediSpartan217 for help with this chapter!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Resident Evil or any mentioned characters. Non-canon characters own themselves. I also don't own Botox or any other recognizable properties.  
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As the wind settled, the two girls shielded their eyes against the glare of afternoon sun. A passing cloud crossed the sun's path, allowing Stevie and Kate to adjust their vision in the comfort of the shade. Their gazes caught the black-clad outline of Albert Wesker, staring at the helicopter in front of him at far end of the rooftop. A closer look proved the presence of HUNK sitting in the pilot's seat of the cockpit, with Krauser and a familiar shadow sitting just inside the helicopter.

Wesker looked at them through the edge of his eyes, smirking as he turned to face them, locking eye contact with the two girls, even though he wore sunglasses. "Ah, there you are," he greeted, "I was wondering when you would catch up to us." The two girls raised their weapons. Wesker let out a short laugh at the reaction. "You wish to fight me? How courageous."

Kate gripped the weapon tightly in her gloved hands. "Where's our friend?" she spoke bravely, trying not to let her voice waver and show weakness.

"She is safe," Wesker replied, "but honestly, I'd thought that two clever girls such as yourselves would have figured it out by now."

"Cut the crap, Wesker!" Stevie spat, changing her grasp on her TMP in case she had to aim quickly, "Where is Mattie?"

Wesker laughed, a hollow chuckle that made the hair on Kate's neck stand on end. "Isn't this one charming little reunion?" he mocked, "She's on the helicopter behind me, perfectly safe."

"What have you done with her?" Kate questioned, now slightly frightened by the villain standing on the other side of the roof.

"Do what?" Wesker replied smoothly.

"Stop playing head games, Wesker!" Stevie snapped, looking angry enough to chew bricks as she pointed her TMP directly at Wesker's chest, "We know you did something!"

"Exactly. That is what interests me," Wesker stated, stepping one foot forward towards the girls, "The three of you are only children, yet you share extensive knowledge about the activities of myself and your 'teammates'."

Kate's hands began shaking from the intimidation. "What are you talking about?" she asked in a wavering voice, beginning to get nervous at the conversation. Where was Wesker going with this?

"The three of you could be very useful to me," the tyrant offered, "You may come with me willingly and unharmed, or I will have to resort to force."

Stevie inhaled deeply, building up the supply of oxygen in her body as she prepared a fitting retort. Kate looked over out of the corner of her eye, anticipating some form of vicious rejection when the Ada clone did something absolutely shocking: She began trolling. "Oh no!" Stevie mocked in a high-pitched voice, making sure Wesker could hear, "I'm so scared! He's threatening us!"

Kate stood in shock, turning her head in deliberate slow motion towards the hyperactive cosplayer as all traces of prior nervousness dissipated. " . . . Remind me why I'm friends with you?" The Claire copy stated as the tension returned to her voice.

The Ada cosplayer smacked her hand against Kate's back. "My buddy! If we get ourselves caught, then I am going down trolling!" Stevie declared loudly.

The palm of Kate's hand connected with her face. "Of course you would..." The Claire cosplayer commented sarcastically as her rifle hung at her side, supported by one hand.

Stevie removed her hand from Kate's back and continued trolling. "Hey Wesker, are we going to finish this in seven minutes, or should I warm up first?" she taunted, watching the veins on the tyrant's head bulge a little more with every word. "Buddy, I don't think we're gonna make it! There's no volcano here!" One of Wesker's fists tightened. The Ada cosplayer grinned; her plan was working. "Kate, I think I know how to defeat him! We'll turn into Tyrants and stab him thirty-seven times in the chest!" she added, causing Wesker to grit his teeth in growing frustration. Meanwhile, Krauser was restraining snorts of laughter at the insults the teenage girl was hurling at his superior like snowballs. Wesker heard these noises and clenched his other fist, glaring at the duo as he grew even more furious.

Kate looked directly at Wesker, causing her internal 'Oh Shit!' meter to spike. "Er, Stevie, you do realize who you are trolling, right?" The Claire cosplayer warned, backing up away from the fuming figure of Wesker at the opposite end of the roof.

The Ada cosplayer laughed at the danger. "Ha! Come on! This is your chance to make bad jokes to their faces!" Stevie protested, before getting an idea and pulling Krauser's beret out of the belt she had taken from Luis, "Watch this." The spastic cosplayer proceeded to mess around with the red hat, twirling it on her finger. "Hey Krauser! Missing something?" she goaded, observing the look on Krauser's face as he recognized his hat, placing the beret on top of her black Ada wig, "I think it matches my dress really well, don't you think?"

Krauser growled in provocation and unsheathed his knife. "Why you little-!" he threatened, preparing to exit the helicopter before Wesker stopped him.

"Don't make me change my mind about not killing you," the tyrant warned the two cosplayers as his eyes flared into red suns behind his glasses, "My plan will work just fine with two."

"Two what? Pairs of extra sunglasses?" Stevie taunted, "Where do you get all those sunglasses, anyway? Umbrella?" the Ada copy continued before turning to her shrinking friend, "Aren't you gonna say something, Kate? Help me out here!"

Kate wracked her brain for good insults. "Hey, what happened to Krauser's shirt?" she said, noticing the mercenary's shirtless state, "What's next? His pants?"

"Gee, I hope not! Nobody wants to see any of that, Krauser!" Stevie added, "By the way Wesker! How's that Botox working for you?"

Wesker growled loudly at the two cosplayers. His temper was slipping fast. "I've had enough of your tomfoolery," he declared, raising one hand. The shadowy figure vaulted over Krauser's shoulder and onto the concrete beside Wesker, revealing the cloaked individual from the Vendor's hall, causing Stevie and Kate's eyes to widen in alarm. Their mysterious enemy bore a strong resemblance to Jill Valentine's raven-themed costume, complete with hood and mask.

The raven charged toward the shocked duo, giving them very little time to react. She flipped Stevie over her shoulder with little effort and tossed the Ada cosplayer mercilessly to the ground before moving to Kate.

The Claire cosplayer anticipated the raven's charge and stood with her feet spaced apart and knees bent. Kate let the rifle fall to her side as she brought her hands up to meet the raven's. The two fighters grappled, meeting each other's strength before Kate sidestepped and released her hold on the enemy, pushing the raven to the floor before the masked foe attempted to overpower her. The beaked mask fell to the concrete upon impact, skittering a short distance away before coming to rest. Kate hesitated and dared to identify the face of the attacker under the black hood, only to be brought down by a well-timed leg sweep that sent her landing on her back and robbed air from her lungs as well. The cloaked individual stood over the two cosplayers, waiting for orders. Wesker beckoned his fighter back to his side as he stepped towards the battered teenagers.

Wesker ceased walking two meters away from the duo. "Have you had enough, or will I have to punish you more?" he asked in a semi-menacing tone.

"You okay?" Kate groaned to Stevie, hissing at the pain shooting up her back.

The Ada cosplayer pushed herself up with her arms, grimacing in pain as well. "Yeah," she grunted before looking up towards Wesker and the cloaked figure. "Who is this guy?" she asked to her friend and herself as they rose to their feet, stumbling a little before regaining their balance.

"Oh, You don't recognize your friend?" Wesker mocked as the raven came to a stop beside him, "How unfortunate. How about we start over?" Stevie and Kate backed away and readied their weapons as Wesker reached over and pulled the piece of black cloth away, revealing a painfully familiar face.

A stunned expression grew on Kate's face as the timid girl lowered her rifle. "No way…" she whispered, shaking her head.

"Merry Mother… " Stevie whispered, equally taken aback before she turned a glare onto Wesker. "What did you do to her, Wesker?"

Wesker simply smirked at the duo's reactions. "Why don't you ask her yourself?" he questioned, gesturing towards the brunette at his side.

Kate stared, wide-eyed, at the female next to the smiling Wesker, feeling like she was going to be ill. Finally, the words fell from the Claire copy's mouth. "Mattie . . . .why?"

Mattie smiled, an evil smirk compared to her usual excited beaming. "I've finally seen what's so important to him," she said; her voice had lowered a few octaves as well, and it scared her would-be rescuers, "And I agree."

Kate and Stevie were dumbstruck. The Mattie they knew would rather side with the heroes any day of the week. Something about her had drastically shifted towards the proverbial 'Dark side'. "But . . . how can you team up with Wesker? Sure, he's smart and powerful, but he's one of the bad guys!" Stevie shouted, attempting to reason with Mattie.

Mattie scoffed before answering. "Both of you should know why. You know what he wants to do. But unlike him," she said with an evil glint in her eyes that showed behind her glasses, "you're expendable."

Time stood still. The Mattie that Kate and Stevie had known for years was completely gone, replaced by a sadistic pawn that now inhabited her body. That revelation combined with Mattie's words shook the duo to the core, and it was by the grace of pure adrenaline and danger that the two of them didn't collapse into emotional wrecks on the spot. Eventually, Kate and Stevie snapped back to reality when Wesker snickered, pulling a small remote from his coat. "Subdue them," he commanded, pressing one of the buttons on the remote.

Mattie sprang into action. She went for Kate first. The Claire cosplayer threw her arms up on impulse to block the attacks, yet her efforts found her kneeling on the concrete as Mattie ruthlessly twisted Kate's arm behind her back. Once she was incapacitated, Mattie delivered a swift kick to the Claire cosplayer's ribs, sending the shy girl to the ground again before turning to Stevie. The Ada cosplayer had her TMP in front of her, aiming but unwilling to fire. Mattie grasped the Ada clone by the neck, gripping tightly before lifting her up and shoving her into the rough concrete roof at a 90-degree angle. What the Jill cosplayer lacked in agility and speed, she made up for in raw strength. Once assured that the girls had been dealt enough punishment, Mattie moved back to stand next to her new master.

Wesker looked upon the two injured girls with a mix of irritation and distaste. "Your persistence is admirable, but I'm growing tired of wasting my time on you two. There is no way you can defy me forever. Give up!" he snarled.

The door into the stairwell slammed open, attracting Wesker's interest when the rest of the search party rushed through with Chris leading the way.

"Ah, here comes the cavalry," Wesker commented sarcastically as the rest of his enemies swept in.

"Wesker!" Jill shouted, aiming her handgun directly at his chest, "We thought you were behind this!"

Chris saw Mattie standing next to Wesker in her cloak, then his eyes spotted Stevie and Kate struggling to get back on their feet. The memories of fighting against Jill began to overwhelm Chris as the BSAA agent's mind rushed back to that fateful battle in the ruins. The encounter had been recreated in front of him, but now three innocent teenagers were the victims of a losing battle. "No! Not them too!" he cried out, grasping his head in his hands as he collapsed to his knees.

Claire immediately rushed up to comfort her brother. "Chris!" she shouted, kneeling down to his level, "Snap out of it!"

"Having flashbacks Redfield?" Wesker taunted, enjoying the suffering of his worst enemy.

Claire turned toward the tyrant with burning fury in her eyes. "That's none of your business!" she countered, standing in front of her brother protectively.

A harsh grunt drew Wesker's attention away from the reinforcements. He glanced over to see Mattie doubled over in place, grasping at her chest and clawing at the fabric of the cloak around her collarbone. "C-Chris? Jill….?" She groaned, sparing a glance at them before turning to Stevie and Kate, "Guys. . . . help!"

Wesker growled at Mattie's attempted resistance. "I thought I told you to subdue them!" he ordered, pulling a small remote out of his pocket and hitting one of the buttons. Mattie screamed in pain, clawing at her chest even more wildly than before.

Kate put two and two together and had an epiphany. "Stevie, I think she's hooked up to a P30 bug," she said, meeting the Ada copy's eyes, holding one side of her ribs as she kept her distance from the struggling Mattie. A second revelation followed the first. "We gotta get it off of her."

" And how do we do that?" Stevie questioned, massaging her bruised neck.

While the BSAA distracted Wesker, two pairs of footsteps raced to Kate and Stevie's side. "Are you two all right?" Rebecca asked as she approached the two girls with Leon beside her.

The two girls turned to the medic as they assessed each other's conditions. The Claire cosplayer wouldn't be surprised if she had a couple of busted ribs, judging by the pain she felt whenever she tried to breathe. Dark purple bruises were blooming on the Ada copy's neck, aside from that a concussion wouldn't be out of the question after the beating she had taken from Mattie. "We can fight a little longer, I think," Stevie said as Kate hissed at the pain in her torso.

"We need a plan," Leon stated, "The best way to get rid of these guys is to divide and conquer."

Stevie nodded in agreement. "Kate and I will take care of Mattie. She's our responsibility," the Ada clone replied.

"Alright. Rebecca is going to hang back and provide medical support. I'll keep Krauser occupied as much as I can on my own," Leon informed Stevie and Kate, "The BSAA are already taking care of Wesker. Barry and Claire are going to try to get HUNK out of the driver's seat. Got it?"

All members of the huddle nodded. "Okay!" Kate rasped, still wincing in pain.

Leon and Rebecca left the girls to take care of their own battles. Meanwhile, Mattie had recovered from resisting the P30 and stood her ground across from Kate and Stevie.

"Okay," Stevie said, looking towards the defensive Mattie, "any ideas?"

Kate breathed deeply, still holding onto her ribs. "We have to figure out where that bug is," she rasped, "It's gotta be under the cloak."

Stevie nodded. "Got it. You distract her," she ordered before dodging out of Mattie's line of sight.

"Mattie! What happened to you?" Kate called, holding Mattie's attention as Stevie sneaked around, "C'mon Mattie! Wake up! We're your friends, remember?"

Mattie hissed in response as she slowly advanced, eyes locked on the Claire cosplayer.

"Mattie, please! I don't want to hurt you! We never asked for this to happen!" Kate pleaded, watching Stevie creep behind Mattie, "We never even knew this COULD happen!"

Once she was close enough, Stevie jumped on Mattie's back, holding on with her legs and one arm as she attempted to find the end of the cloak. Mattie struggled, eventually pulling Stevie off of her and kicking the Ada cosplayer in the stomach, knocking Stevie backwards.

"I can't get the cloak off, but I can feel it on her chest!" Stevie reported, clutching her stomach and trying not to throw up what little she had eaten.

Kate nodded. "Alright! Stevie, I'm gonna have to estimate the bug's position and shoot it! It's too risky to rip the device off!" the Claire cosplayer warned, as she readied her rifle, "Hold her still for me!"

Stevie exhaled and recovered quickly. "Got it!" the spastic cosplayer replied, "You better not hit me! If you do, I'm coming back to haunt you in hell!"

The two cosplayers circled Mattie like sharks, eyes peeled for any sign of anticipated movement. "Easy does it, Mattie," Kate coaxed, "We're a team; we're all going to get out of this alive."

Stevie grabbed Mattie from behind again, this time holding Mattie's arms out of the way as the Jill cosplayer thrashed violently. "Got her! Hurry!" Stevie shouted, dodging Mattie's boots as they tried to stomp on the Ada clone's toes.

Kate pulled her rifle into position and aimed. "Hold her. . . . " Kate said, focusing on the specific point on Mattie's collarbone before pulling the trigger. Stevie heard the sound of cracking glass below her, followed by a small push backwards. "I got it!" Stevie released the flailing Mattie from her grasp. For several seconds, the Jill cosplayer's erratic movements resembled a chicken missing its head before falling forward, unconscious, onto the concrete.

Kate sighed deeply and readjusted the sniper rifle onto her back. "We got it," the Claire cosplayer breathed, "Is she alright?"

"She's out cold," Stevie commented, looking down at her friend, "That bump on her head doesn't look good, though."

Kate nodded, agreeing with Stevie. "Yeah, let's get her to Rebecca," she suggested, "She'll know what to do."

The two girls picked up Mattie, supporting their unconscious friend with their shoulders as they carried her to the side of the area where the roof connected to the stairwell. Rebecca had set up her emergency medical station there, out of enemy sight. As the three cosplayers approached, the young medic was patching up a stray gunshot wound on the BSAA agent's side, spraying an herb mixture on the injury so the skin would stitch back together.

The girls stopped a few feet short of the medic station. "Chris, you alright?" Kate asked as the bulky agent got to his feet.

Chris looked up at the trio. "I'll be fine!" he replied, before taking notice of Mattie's condition, "Is she-?"

"We don't know!" Stevie replied, "We need to get her out of here!"

A shockwave, no doubt caused by one of Wesker's fists colliding with the concrete roof, shook Stevie and Kate's footing as they held on to Mattie. "I'll take her! It's too dicey up here; we're going below!" Chris informed. The two girls handed Mattie over to Chris, who now held their friend's unconscious body in his arms. "Claire and Barry are helping with Wesker," he informed, "You two stay up here and provide back-up! We could use some sniper support up there." Chris gestured with his head.

Kate followed Chris' gesture to the top of the giant air-conditioning unit that inhabited the rooftop. "I see it," she verified.

As Kate ran off to climb the ladder to the top of the air-conditioning unit, Chris turned to Stevie. "I'm gonna go help Leon. There are more than enough people going up against Wesker," the Ada cosplayer spoke before departing to assist the government agent, "Take care of Mattie, alright? She's important to us."

Chris nodded at Stevie's back as the girl ran to join the fray before he retreated into the stairwell with Rebecca. Treatment of the P30 bug would be much easier without outside influence. Fighting Jill to remove the bug was hard enough. Thankfully, Mattie was already unconscious.

As soon as Kate got to the top of the air conditioning unit, she searched for the best vantage point that was available. Once a clear space was found, Kate settled to her knees and arranged her rifle, aiming downwards at the battlefield. "Alright, I can see HUNK in the helicopter," Kate thought as she scanned over the helicopter. "There's the BSAA taking care of Wesker. And Leon's keeping Krauser busy," she added, witnessing as Stevie ran up to join Leon's side. "But wait a minute, where's-!" Her thoughts were interrupted by a set of fingers digging into her scalp.

Kate's rifle dropped from her hands, as she yelped at the burning pain in her head. "I don't think we need any interference from up here," a smooth, feminine voice stated, nestling their fingers tighter into Kate's hair as she pulled the girl to her feet. The heavy accent and stifling perfume was a dead giveaway. The Claire cosplayer whimpered piteously in terror as she realized the identity of her captor. "I know what to do with you." Excella began pulling Kate backwards. The timid girl looked around to see where the executive was taking her. The taller woman was dragging her to the edge of the air conditioning unit.

"Holy crap she's going to toss me over!" The Claire copy thought rapidly as she imagined the fate Excella had planned for her, too scared to scream as she was dragged to the edge, "What do I do? I'm too young to die!" The girl held back tears of pain as her bare feet scraped against the concrete like sandpaper, searching for an object to grip on to. "No good!" she thought, willing the punishment to end, "Make it STOP!" At the end of that thought, instinct kicked in. Something had changed in the timid girl's demeanor. Enough was enough. Time to get down to business.

"What do you think you're doing?" Excella demanded when her prey began to squirm in resistance. Despite the Gionne's strong grip, Kate rearranged her footing and shifted all one hundred and twenty-five pounds of her weight forward, relying on gravity, upper body strength, and what little friction her feet could find on the crown of the air conditioning unit. The Claire copy wasn't even trying to be dead weight, like the Tricell executive had expected. The fearful cosplayer was not afraid anymore; she was fed up with being on the losing side, and fear had transformed in defiance. Nevertheless Excella gave the root of the sniper's ponytail a sharp tug in an attempt to regain control.

Kate grunted and jerked away from Excella's grasp, ceasing the journey towards the edge. "I've! Had!" Kate growled through the pain in her skull, turning one angry eye to aim at the Gionne as she raised one leg. "Enough!" The Claire cosplayer finished as she thrust her leg backwards. The Claire clone's aim was high and true, ending with a forceful kick to Excella's abdomen. The Tricell executive immediately bent over in pain as the bare foot connected, loosening her grip on Kate's hair. The Claire cosplayer took this opportunity to free herself and take up her rifle by the barrel. The weapon may have been meant for long-range combat, but it was heavy.

As Excella recovered, the villainess looked up at her prey, only to meet the girl's feral gaze a second before the butt of the rifle connected with her head. The executive's body hit the ground, unconscious, as Kate prepared another strike.

"Good hit," a smooth female voice said, catching the Claire copy's attention and snapping the girl back into her own mind.

Kate's personality returned, and she twisted in place to find Ada standing behind her. The girl didn't bother asking how long the spy had been watching; a more important question was on her mind. "Ada!" Kate greeted, somewhat nonplussed at the spy's sudden reappearance, "Where were you? You disappeared on the fifth floor."

Ada glanced down at the progress of the battles below. "I don't have time to explain," she stated, setting a long, silver suitcase in front of Kate, "Take this and use it on the helicopter!"

Kate dropped her rifle at her side and bent down to open the case. The locks were easy enough to manage, but it was the contents of the case that surprised her. Kate's eyes widened as they took in the shiny, pristine rocket-propelled grenade and accompanying launcher. "Hey! Wha wha wha Wait WHAT?" Kate stuttered, attempting to determine WHY the launcher was important. Handling a rifle and sniping targets was one thing, but a rocket was a whole different ballpark. The cosplayer looked up at Ada. "WHEN?" the Claire copy asked, too shocked to form a proper sentence.

"Got it from your friend the Merchant," the spy explained, glancing down at the battles a second time, "Hurry! They're trying to escape!"

Kate turned to follow Ada's gaze. Sure enough, Krauser and Wesker had hopped on the aircraft as the blades sped up. Below them, the rest of the fighters continued firing on Wesker and his associates.

The black-clad tyrant smirked at the crowd of survivors that attempted to stop him, only to be blown backwards by the lashing wind that the helicopter provided. "I'm afraid your luck has run out," Wesker stated, glaring down at the gathering with the full force of his red eyes; the sunglasses had been shattered by a shot from Barry's trusty magnum. "You may have overpowered me this time," he said, pulling the remote he had used to control Mattie from his trench coat, "But I still have an ace in the hole. I suggest you hurry."

Jill aimed for the remote with her handgun, only to be interrupted by Kate's voice. "Heads up!" the Claire copy shouted from above, and one second later, a rocket missile flew over the survivors' heads. Everyone below ducked to the ground and covered their faces in anticipation of flying rubble.

The explosion never happened. HUNK saw the rocket coming his way and swerved the helicopter, effectively dodging the rocket as the projectile flew past the aircraft and exploded into one of the neighboring buildings, sending flurries of broken glass tumbling to the street.

"Damn," Leon seethed quietly as the helicopter flew into the distance, carrying Wesker and Krauser with it.

"There goes another chance to get rid of that bastard," Claire added under her breath, hands placed firmly on her hips, "Would a second rocket be a little too much to hope for?"

"Wonder what he was here for anyways?" Barry questioned as he moved to stand next to the spectators, watching as black smoke poured from the skyscraper next door.

Stevie blinked at the partially destroyed building in disbelief. "Okay, who gave Alfred the rocket launcher? You totally missed!" the spastic cosplayer said sarcastically as Kate sat on the air-cooling unit, dangling her legs over the edge like nothing had happened.

"Hey, it moved at the last second, alright?" the Claire cosplayer argued, brandishing the empty launcher, "I had that thing in my crosshairs!"

"Bull!" the Ada clone replied, looking upwards at her friend.

Jill stepped between the girls. "It doesn't matter now. He still got away," she said, shaking her head at the fact that Wesker had escaped again.

Kate looked to her side, hoping to see a particular character. "Wait a minute, where did Ada go?" the quiet girl asked, "Did you see her leave?"

Jill blinked. "Ada was here?" she replied curiously, gazing at the Claire cosplayer.

Kate nodded. "Of course she was. Where did you think I got this?" the girl replied, holding up the barren launching mechanism for everyone to see. "Somebody should probably come up and arrest Excella now," she added as an afterthought, remembering her nemesis' unconscious body behind her.

"Excella was up there too?" Sheva asked incredulously as she approached the trio.

Kate turned to gaze down at the African agent. "She snuck up and tried to sabotage me," the Claire copy explained, "I knocked her out with my rifle. She's not going anywhere."

Sheva jogged to the ladder attached to the air conditioning unit and climbed. The African agent paused when she reached the top, scanning the surface of the cooling unit before turning her head back to Jill. "Excella's not up here," the African woman reported, prompting a strange expression from Kate.

"What!" Kate asked, turning to look behind her. What Sheva said was true: Excella's body was gone. The Claire copy turned back to Jill and Stevie. "She was here! Honest!" Kate retorted, pondering how in the world Excella could disappear without attracting attention.

Stevie raised her eyebrows at Kate's testimony. "Huh. Guess I'm not the only one that hit their head a little hard," the Ada cosplayer stated. As she spoke, the girl began to slightly sway in her high heels. "Speaking of which, I'm feeling kind of dizzy."

The blue-clad agent sighed. "Let's get back downstairs. Chris and Rebecca are waiting for us," Jill said, "We'll get everybody fixed up, then the rest of this mess can be sorted out." The remaining fighters nodded in agreement and gravitated towards the door leading into the stairwell, mentally exhausted but alive and willing to fight another day.

**AN: There's the action chapter! Yes, parts are similar to a certain battle in RE5! Last chapter is going to tie up the plot twists (or would that be untying the plot twists?) Plus, there's going to be a special character cameo! XD**

**I have an announcement concerning this story! My friend JediSpartan217 and I have been discussing a potential sequel for some time now. I've started writing rough drafts of the first chapters, so hit the poll on my profile (check out my other stories while you're there!) and/or tell me what you think in a review! Bye!**


	15. Chapter 15  Epilogue

**AN: Here it is, the epilogue. I spent all my effort on this last chapter; I barely wrote any of my side projects so I could focus on this one. I would like to thank everybody that stuck with and reviewed this story, especially to my regulars! I hope you will continue to read my other stories and follow me in future fan fiction endeavors.**

**For now, enjoy.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Resident Evil, or its characters and properties. I also don't own Capcom either. Non-Canon characters own themselves.**

Claire took point as the group made their way to the bottom floor of the hotel. At the landing of the twenty-ninth floor, Stevie had nearly collapsed as a result of her concussion, and since Leon was the closest person to her, the government agent had taken it upon himself to support the Ada cosplayer by acting as her personal crutch so she wouldn't fall over and hit her head again, an action that made Stevie blush and suppress another fangirly squeal of joy.

And somewhere around the twenty-fifth floor, Rebecca had noticed the bloody footprints that Kate had been tracking behind her. When the medic told her, the Claire cosplayer checked the bottoms of her feet to find a number of raw, bleeding scrapes from when Excella attempted to drag her across the rooftop. Upon realization, Kate cried out in agony and crumpled to the concrete as the pain registered in her head. The sting of the wounds made it impossible for the Claire cosplayer to walk, and since Rebecca had been carrying all the herbs and medical sprays, Barry volunteered to carry Kate the rest of the way down the stairs, since Leon was indisposed. The Claire cosplayer didn't mind the arrangement, but promptly clammed up and focused her eyes on the stairs below, once again realizing how close she was to a supposedly fictional character. "I can even smell the sandwiches on him," she thought absentmindedly as the Claire cosplayer was carefully transported down the stairs with her arms wrapped around Barry's neck so she wouldn't slip out of his grasp

When the group made it to the ground floor, Jill and Sheva rushed ahead to check for danger, leaving Claire, the men, and the two newly minted survivors to wait in the stairwell. "Don't worry," Claire reassured the two girls as Jill and Sheva checked the area, "We'll get the both of you to Rebecca. She knows what she's doing."

Jill returned quickly, poking her head back into the stairwell. "All clear," she announced.

Claire and the men entered the lobby, which was once again, suspiciously devoid of undead or infected. Everything else was in its proper place, though. **"**Is it just me, or does that potted plant look like a giant green herb?" Stevie asked, pointing her free arm towards a random plant in the far corner of the lobby, "Cause I can't tell; I'm not feelin' so great."

Claire looked over at the plant in question. The spacing of the leaves DID look familiar. "Huh, whaddaya know? It is a giant herb," she confirmed as Jill and Sheva briskly jogged towards the potted plant.

"How on earth did we miss this?" Jill grumbled under her breath as she and Sheva plucked several leaves off the plant while Leon and Barry set their charges to rest against a wall. Jill came back and kneeled down next to Stevie and began bandaging the Ada cosplayer's head while Sheva took care of Kate's injuries.

"Hey Sheva, Why don't ya put one of those herbs on my head?" Stevie complained, looking over at Sheva, "I feel a migraine the size of Wesker's ego coming on."

Sheva shook her head. "Sorry, but the herbs and first aid spray work best on external injuries," the African agent explained as she squeezed a green tinted gel from the leaf she held, "We'll fix the internal damage once you're in BSAA custody."

"What about our families?" Kate asked, hissing in pain as Sheva applied the gel to the stinging cuts on her feet, only to feel the dull ache crawl up from her broken ribs.

"We'll contact them and tell them you're safe and none the worse for wear," Jill said, as she tied off the bandage, "It's standard procedure for civilians. We have to make sure you aren't contaminated with anything before we let you back into your regular lives."

The two girls looked at each other and sighed. "Alright," Stevie spoke for the both of them.

"But first," Kate added, "I need to make a detour."

The two girls emerged from the hotel much later, leaning on Leon's strong shoulders, slightly weary, but clean. The two girls sighed in relief as the fresh air and sunlight brushed against their faces. Stevie told Leon to pause on the stone steps, relishing the feeling of fulfillment that came with survival, whereas Kate disconnected herself from Leon and found satisfaction in walking down the steps with a collection of poster tubes and a bag of keychains tucked under her arm. The loot the Claire cosplayer had stockpiled had not gone unforgotten, despite wincing at the slight pins-and-needles numbness in her feet as she walked.

Once on the sidewalk, the Claire cosplayer glanced around, searching for Chris and Rebecca. "Found them!" she said as she gingerly walked towards the two ex-STARS, motioning for Stevie and Leon to follow her.

"Chris! Rebecca!" Stevie called as she and her friend approached, garnering the attention of the survivors. Chris turned to look at them, revealing a sleeping Mattie bundled in his arms. The two girls noticed and came closer for a better look.

"Is she alright?" Kate asked, stopping short of where Chris stood. The burly agent nodded as he turned his body toward the girls, assuring them that Mattie was okay, albeit unconscious.

"We were able to get the bug off with no complications," Rebecca explained as she stepped forward, "However, she started to squirm and wake up once we got it off, so we wrapped her up in the cloak and gave her some morphine for the pain." The young medic bent forward and whispered to the two cosplayers, "She's going to be a little loopy for the next several hours. Just thought I should warn you."

Mattie stirred under the cloak, beginning to wake up from the morphine and looked up at her friends. "Hey guys," she said lazily, " I got a bump on my head. . . What happened to ya? You're all . . . colorful. So colorful."

Stevie and Kate glanced at each other with content smiles. Their friend had been returned to them. "We got caught in a fist fight," Stevie explained, "We'll tell you more when you're sober."

"Oh good," Mattie replied hazily as her head rolled back, "I thought I was just trippin' balls." The three cosplayers chuckled at the lame Internet joke, despite the Claire cosplayer's bandaged ribs while Chris, Leon, and Rebecca stood around with confused looks on their faces.

"Where are the others?" Chris asked the feminine-haired agent.

"They're inside, clearing out the rest of the infected and zombies in the building while the clean-up unit arrives," Leon replied.

"What about Wesker?" Chris continued, "I heard an explosion."

"I'm afraid he got away," a female voice replied. Everyone turned to face the new speaker.

"Ada!" Leon started as the spy approached from around the corner. "Where were you?" he asked, "You disappeared all of a sudden."

"I was keeping myself busy," the red spy said as she joined the group, "But first . . ." Ada pulled her handgun from her side and pointed it at Rebecca's head. "I need those files that were collected from Irving's workshop."

Rebecca froze. Both men stiffened but were unable to draw their weapons. The two cosplayers could only stare in shock. Were they wrong about Ada?

"Ada, how could you?" Stevie objected angrily, attempting to take a step forward, only to be caught by Leon when she nearly fell again, "Is this a double-cross?"

"We thought you were on our side!" Kate exclaimed, staring up at the spy.

Ada glanced at the two girls. "I am on your side, but I have a job to do," she replied, not letting her guard down for a second as she turned back to Rebecca, "Now hand over those files. It would be a shame if someone got hurt."

"What do you want with them, Ada?" Leon questioned. He knew the spy must have had a reason; she had saved his life a number of times back in Spain, so there must be a motive for this as well.

"Those files have information my employer needs," Ada stated, "That's all I'm after. Nothing else."

Rebecca carefully reached into her pack and pulled out the files that she had gathered, handing them to the spy with shaky hands. "That wasn't so hard," Ada said as she secured the files and holstered her handgun. The spy's dark eyes connected with Kate and Stevie's. "Sorry you had to see that," Ada apologized, "But I have my own plans to keep."

The two cosplayers began to object, only to be silenced by the sound of whirring blades. The harsh winds announced the arrival of another helicopter, but this one proved to be smaller and more compact as it came into the cosplayers' view. "It appears my friends have arrived," Ada said as the aircraft was lowered into sight, revealing another familiar character leaning out of the side.

"Surprise!" a black-clad, brunette woman shouted to the gathering below.

Stevie and Kate looked up, did a double-take, and recognized the woman immediately. "Alice?" they reacted in unison, caught off guard by her arrival. Mattie was awake, but still a little too loopy to realize what was happening, so the Jill cosplayer decided to count how many times the blades spun around.

"The one and only," Alice confirmed, smiling down at the group, "What did I miss?"

"EVERYTHING!" Stevie shouted back, reciting the punch line of another inside joke she and her friends shared. "The party ended ages ago!"

"Damn it," Alice cursed before turning to Ada, "You got the documents?" The spy nodded. "Good. You give them the invitation yet?" Alice gestured to the three cosplayers.

A confused look appeared on Kate's face. "What invitation?" she queried, cocking her head at Ada.

The spy turned to the two girls. "The Organization was watching your actions during the outbreak. Congratulations, you passed the test," she said with a small smile.

Kate's confusion turned into irritation. "A test?" she repeated, eyebrows furrowing as she moved to stand in front of her friends, "Releasing the T-virus into a hotel is your idea of a test?"

Ada blinked, taken aback at the usually shy girl's outburst. "The outbreak was all Wesker's doing. We just took advantage of the situation to collect data on the civilian survival rate and scout for potential recruits. And the three of you made the cut."

"Wait," Chris said as the Claire cosplayer began to calm down, "You knew Wesker was here? Why would he decide to start an outbreak in a hotel?"

Ada turned to the BSAA agent. "Wesker would have targeted the hotel because of the high concentration of people, especially during a popular event like a convention. The outbreak would have started his second attempt of world domination," Ada explained, "Believe me, Alice and I know his attack patterns."

"Oh, and if you're still wondering how you got here," Alice added from above, "We had to use nerve gas and drop you in. Our organization couldn't just risk its own people, so we contacted the president and decided to bring in the professionals."

Chris began to protest when he was cut off. "Any particular reason you want us to be recruits?" Stevie asked.

"It's not like people are lining up for a job," Ada said sarcastically before her tone turned severe, "The whole reason I disappeared on the fifth floor was so I could keep an eye on all three of you at the same time. You all have the skills and discipline required of an operative, but you need proper training before the Organization would dream of sending you into field missions."

Kate swallowed a lump in her throat. "So what happens now?" she asked nervously.

Ada turned her head to face the Claire doppelganger. "You have a chance to enter the Organization," she replied, "It's your decision whether you want to join."

Stevie sank into an exaggerated "thinking" pose. "Hmm. Depends on where we go," she replied, "Spain and Africa are definite no-nos. And how do we get there? Boat?" She glanced at Chris, noticing the slight twitch in his features as he recalled the events that had taken place on the Queen Zenobia. "Train?" Now it was Rebecca's turn to subtly flinch. "Airplane?" Leon's face twitched a little, remembering the Harvardville airport disaster. "Car? Helicopter?" Stevie continued.

"Don't both of those have a tendency to explode?" Kate added before turning back to the two operatives, "Just give us some horses; we'll find our way there."

Alice's eyebrows shot up. "So you're coming with us?" she asked.

The Claire copy considered her answer carefully. "Not yet," she replied, glancing at her loopy friend before looking back to Ada, "We'll get back to you once Mattie can walk in a straight line. However, we'll pass on the offer for now."

"Fair enough," Ada replied.

"Hang on a sec," Stevie realized, "If Wesker, Krauser, HUNK, and supposedly Excella all got away, then where the heck is Irving?"

The group of survivors scanned the area, searching wildly for the missing businessman. "I see him!" Alice said, pointing down at the far corner of the city block the hotel sat on, "He's making a run for it!"

The gathering followed Alice's finger, and sure enough, Irving was anxiously hopping around on the corner with a hastily stuffed briefcase at his side. He appeared to be flagging down the helicopter, but when he realized the cadre of survivors was watching him, Irving picked up the briefcase and darted into the street. "Sir! Permission to pursue him?" Rebecca asked Chris. The male agent opened his mouth to reply, but a city bus cut him off. as it charged out of nowhere and rammed directly into Irving head-on. The businessman's body went flying through the air, past the group of survivors, and landed on the street a few meters away, where he rolled around on the ground some ways before flopping to rest on the pavement.

The driver emerged from the bus, jumping in terror as he saw Irving's mangled body. "Oh shit! I hit someone!" the bus driver panicked, "I'm gonna get fired this time!"

"Hit him again!" Stevie encouraged from the sidewalk, "Finish him off!"

Ada gave a small twitch at her doppelganger's behavior. "That won't be necessary," the spy stated, "He's in enough of a bad state already."

Stevie reconsidered what to say. "Yeah you're right," she said, nodding to Ada before calling out to the driver, "Nevermind! He'll be okay! Hey Irving! Irving! Wiggle your 'standards' if you can hear us!" From out in the road, one of Irving's hands lifted upwards and delivered a one-finger salute in the general direction of the survivors. "Aww, what a cute little bird!" the Ada clone taunted before commenting, "Amazing how he can do that, considering the amount of blood he's losing."

Chris' eyes widened, recalling Irving's part in Wesker's plans. "Wait . . . shit! The bomb's still inside! It could blow at any second!" the BSAA agent declared, drawing his radio to call the others who remained inside the building.

"You mean this bomb?" Alice said, drawing the group's attention upward as she pulled the disarmed Uroboros bomb out of the depths of the helicopter, holding on to it by one of the cylinders as she showed off her trophy, "Ada took care of it and gave it to me for safe-keeping!" Alice saw the concerned look on Chris' face and added, "Don't worry, the virus inside has been eliminated. It's empty now." She knocked on one of the metal cylinders, reassuring the BSAA as it produced a hollow metallic echo.

The spy nodded. "Anyway, we better go pick up Irving before the authorities arrive," Ada reminded her partner, "The Organization won't be happy if he gets caught."

"Yeah," Alice agreed, tossing down a ladder for her compatriot, "I'm pretty sure the media vans are already on the way. That explosion from before wasn't exactly tiny. Capco- I mean, the Organization's gonna throw a fit if anyone else finds out about this."

"Hold up!" Stevie called, stopping Ada as she moved to climb up the ladder, "So, Capcom and the Organization are the same thing?" Ada gave no movements in response. "I knew it!"

The spy turned to face her doppelganger. "Is that all?" Ada asked with a serious expression.

The spastic cosplayer nodded. "Just wanted to say it out loud," Stevie replied with a smile on her face.

"Then I guess this is 'goodbye'," Ada responded, grabbing a hold of the ladder that Alice had tossed down, "That is, until we hear from you about your decision." The spy gave one final glance at the two coherent doppelgangers. "Oh, before I forget, nice costumes. See you around." Stevie and Kate's hearts swelled at the spy's praise. Ada gave the girls a small wave, and then signaled to Alice, who in turn signaled the helicopter's pilot to move towards Irving's location. Mattie was still slightly out of it, so she rested in Chris' arms quietly as she followed the helicopter as it flew overhead; she couldn't exactly move very much with the cloak wrapped around her.

The small group of survivors observed from the sidewalk as a crew of black-clad operatives dropped from the helicopter, picked up Irving, and pulled him inside the aircraft before flying into the late afternoon sun. "Well, what now?" Kate asked Leon and the remaining ex-STARS. With the disappearance of two well-loved characters and all traces of mortal danger nonexistent, there was no telling what could occur in their lives next.

"My back is getting sore from having to lean over is what," Leon groaned, sarcastic as ever as Stevie leaned her weight on him, "Could somebody take this misfit off me?"

"Hey!" the aforementioned misfit complained, "I'm right here, you know!"

"I'll take her," Kate volunteered, jogging briskly to Leon and Stevie. The government agent passed the Ada cosplayer onto Kate's shoulders without any trouble.

"Right, personally, I'd like to take you girls' testimony concerning this whole debacle," Leon said, "Just so I can report everyone's stories straight. I'm pretty sure the BSAA will want a copy as well."

"Alright," Stevie said as she leaned on Kate's side, "You wanna know what happened? A lot of bad crap. You were there for most of it, remember, Leon?"

"True," Leon replied, "But I should get everyone's story, just in case."

The Claire cosplayer sighed. "It's . . it's gonna take a while to recall all of it," Kate said as the memories started replaying at full speed in her head, "Any chance we can paraphrase?"

Leon shrugged. "Might as well," he said, "I'll fill in the blanks."

"Like I said: BAD. CRAP. HAPPENED. End of story," Stevie repeated.

"It's probably gonna take some therapy to get through the trauma," Kate added.

The Ada cosplayer turned to her friend. "Therapy?" she questioned, smacking her friend lightly on the back of her head, "I want to remember all this! So should you!"

A light giggle came from the resting Mattie, who was having the time of her life being held in Chris' arms, despite the fact she was loopy on morphine. She amused herself by wiggling her toes under the heavy cloak and chuckling at her friends' behavior. "We're so weird," she said in a dreamy tone.

"That's right," Chris replied, readjusting the hare-brained Jill clone in his grasp before turning to the others, "Now let's get you inside before the sun sets. There's a lot of explaining to do."

Stevie and Kate nodded and followed Leon back into the hotel, with Chris, Rebecca, and Mattie close behind them. They reunited with Jill, Sheva, Claire, and Barry in the lobby, who welcomed Chris and Rebecca with warm smiles and the message that the BSAA clean-up crew had just arrived. A BSAA medic was checking Mattie's condition, giving Rebecca their second opinion as the clean-up crew dispersed into the hotel.

"Looks like everything is being taken care of," Jill said under her breath, as the final crew was dispatched into the Vendor's hall, "Now where are those girls? Leon finished his call to the President; he's probably going to want to talk to them."

The female agent spotted Claire standing to the side of the lobby. "Claire," Jill started as she strode towards her, "Have you seen—"

The younger woman shushed Jill as she stopped to stand next to her, gesturing to something on the ground. The female agent gave the Redfield an odd look until she realized what Claire was pointing at. Stevie and Kate had peacefully drifted into slumber near Mattie's side as their friend lay on a stretcher to be carried out later. The mental fatigue and respective adrenaline crashes had finally caught up to them, rendering the three girls dead to the world as they slept.

"Damn. Sometimes you forget how old they really are," Claire said softly as she watched the girls rest, "Yet they've already been through such an ordeal."

Jill nodded. "Yep," she agreed, softening her features as she thought about the cosplayers' future, "But there's a long way for them to go yet."

The girls' trips on the PTSD roller coaster would last a few months, but afterward the three friends would look back on the hotel outbreak and laugh at each other's adventures; their experiences in the ultimate game of survival horror would stay with them for the rest of their years. But for now, the three survivors were more than content with simply being alive.

**AN: Well, that's the end of this story. I am SO thankful for the reviews and support from all my readers. You should also thank JediSpartan217 for cracking the whip and making me work when I got lazy with writing chapters of this story.**

**Yup, the final cameo character was Alice from the Resident Evil movies. The version of her I had in mind for this chapter was the Alice from Afterlife or the upcoming Retribution. I like those versions of her better than in the first three movies, so that's what I went with. Also, Milla Jovovich is a freakin' BAMF. I'll stop rambling.**

**From the reviews I have from the last chapter, (which at this point, is only two. Where are my regulars? TwT I'm talking to you, haalyle and Experimental Agent 1123!) it sounds like only one person is interested in a sequel. ( . . .Okay, there are two people. At least two.) However, to be sure, I WANT PEOPLE TO VISIT MY PROFILE AND VOTE. I have a poll that needs loving! Otherwise, the rest of you will have to wait for a very long time for your sequel! (Even longer since I haven't started officially writing it yet!) So yeah, hit up that poll.**

**Anyway, before I post any part of the sequel, I want to work on some of my other projects. I know I have a few big ones started and saved on my laptop. I think I know which one I'm going to post next…**

**Well, anyway, keep in touch, reviewers! My PM box is open! And until next time . . . just keep re-reading this story and everything else I've posted! Bye bye!**


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